


the string can tangle, but never break

by gothw0n



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Children, Alternate Universe - Middle School, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Childhood Friends, Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Mentioned Boo Seungkwan, Mentioned Chwe Hansol | Vernon, Mentioned Hong Jisoo | Joshua, Mentioned Jeon Wonwoo, Mentioned Lee Seokmin | DK, Mentions of Masturbation, Mentions of homophobia, Minor Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups/Yoon Jeonghan, Minor Kim Mingyu/Xu Ming Hao | The8, Minor Kwon Soonyoung | Hoshi/Lee Jihoon | Woozi, Romantic Soulmates, Sort Of, Soulmates, Wen Jun Hui | Jun-centric, Xu Ming Hao | The8 is Bad at Feelings, but also angsty, but the relationships kinda were oops, can be triggering, cursing, every svt member is at least mentioned, junhao are soft, junhui overthinks and spirals, mentions of sex but no in-depth descriptions, minghao experiences comphet, minor anxiety mentions, sexuality is a big part of this story, slowburn, some are their actual ages in real life some are younger, some play bigger roles, stop reading tags now if you don’t want relatively minor spoilers, they are not all around the same age
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:00:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 47,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23224423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gothw0n/pseuds/gothw0n
Summary: “the two people connected by the red thread are destined lovers, regardless of place, time, or circumstances. this magical cord may stretch or tangle, but never break. this myth is similar to the western concept of soulmate or a destined partner.“in which junhui and minghao encounter each other at various stages of their lives, bonding like soulmates. however, each time they meet, their string of fate gets tangled, and they’re subsequently pushed apart again.but they’ll always find their way back to each other.
Relationships: Wen Jun Hui | Jun/Xu Ming Hao | The8
Comments: 4
Kudos: 55





	1. yr 1- 2005

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> as jun got into the backseat of the car, minghao tapped on the window. jun rolled it down, 
> 
> “hey, i’ll call you on friday okay? my parents are mad at me because they figured out i was sneaking out of the house, so i’m probably gonna be grounded for a while. but i promise i’ll call okay? have fun in shenzhen!! catch a bunch of frogs for me!!”
> 
> minghao flashed his bright smile, small dimples appearing on the corners of his mouth. jun felt that happiness again, and smiled even brighter. 
> 
> as the car drove away, junhui laughed at minghao attempting to run alongside the car, waving at him after he stopped. he waved until minghao was not minghao, but a dot standing on a dirt road, then they turned a corner and he was no more.
> 
> driving on the same dirt road as he had months earlier, his stomach bubbled again. this time, he didn’t eat too much ice cream and had to throw up. he felt excitement: he had made a new best friend.

the bumpy dirt road proved to be too much for junhui’s stomach, as he could barely tell his parents that his tummy felt weird before hurling onto the back of the driver’s seat.  
he knew he shouldn’t have eaten that leftover ice cream in the back of the freezer.  
as his parents pulled over to the side of road, frantically asking if he was okay and to get out of the car, the first thought that went through jun’s mind was

“this will surely get me out of going to grandma’s”

alas, it did not. after his parents cleaned up the mess, jun asked if he could stay with them since he was sick.

“does your stomach still hurt?”

jun’s dad asked. jun lied, but his parents caught onto it. 

“you’re fine, junhui. you’re still going to grandma’s; we’re only 30 minutes away”.

his mom turned and looked at him, a slight frown etched on her face.

“why do you not want to go to grandma’s? it’ll be fun there, she has lots of animals like chickens: you could play with a baby chick!!”

jun continued to stare out the window, not acknowledging his mother, but heaving a long, dramatic sigh.

“but it’ll be so boring, all my friends are back home in shenzhen and it’ll just be me, grandma, and... mei”

he shuddered at the mere mention of his cousin, mei. she was 3 years older than him, and the only memories jun has of her are all the times she forced him to wear dresses and pose to her shrieking friends

he circled back to the present: he wasn’t getting out of going to his grandma’s.

it wasn’t like he hated being with his grandmother. on the contrary, he loved her: she always fed him the best food, better than his mom’s, until he felt sleepy. she’d talk to him about her long life and all that she’s experienced and would listen to jun talk about his wushu classes and first days at school.

he just hated that she lived in the middle of nowhere. jun was a city boy: he loved his home in shenzhen with the loud, bustling fish markets. he didn’t understand why people would choose to live out in the countryside where the only company were the farm animals. he loved animals as much as the next kid, but he knew he’d get bored after a while, especially with no other kids his age to play with (mei was NOT an option).

and it wasn’t like he was going for a week or two, he had to spend the whole summer there! worse, his parents were leaving two days after they arrived to thailand for a vacation without junhui, since they couldn’t afford to purchase another plane ticket.

he couldn’t believe how selfish his parents were. dumping their only child at his grandma’s boring place for the summer, only to spend their time on fun beaches in thailand.

he had made so many plans with his friends too, and now he was miles and miles away from all of them....

jun slumped down in his seat until the seatbelt nearly covered his face, muttering,

“this blows...”

luckily, his parents didn’t hear him. they drove in mostly silence for the rest of the car ride, jun dozing off here and there, but was awoken by the sudden stop of the car. his mom turned back towards him,

“we’re here... time to get out, jun”

begrudgingly, jun opened the car door, stepped out, and slammed it shut. he stopped in his tracks to take in his surroundings,

the shadows of mountains circled the horizon, looming over the soft green hills that rolled over the land. rows and rows of crops stretched as far as the eye could see, and jun could just barely make out what looked to be a river far to the east surrounded by a wooded area. 

his grandmother’s house stood in front of him. it was a small, traditional home: obviously built a very long time ago. thus, it wasn’t meant to house more than 3, max 4 people, but jun knew that by his family’s standards, this house was big. after all, his grandma was his most well-off relative.

jun’s immediate family wasn’t poor, his parents had good, stable jobs in the city. they tried to make life as comfortable for junhui as possible, but as he grew up, he would realize that they could barely afford to pay the rent on their 2 bedroom apartment in a not-so-safe area of shenzhen. again, his family wasn’t poor: they just lived paycheck to paycheck as many other families unfortunately have to. 

his extended family, however, were barely scraping by. he rarely visited his relatives on his dad’s side, but he overheard his parents talking about his cousins and how they didn’t go to school because they had to work on their family’s farms, how they sometimes had to live alone for long periods of time because their parents went to find work in the city.

his grandma lived alone, only occasionally receiving visits from her children and grandchildren. never had she had her family stay for so long, and her excitement showed from the moment she went out to greet jun and his parents, 

“junhui!! oh look how tall you’ve gotten, you’ll surely surpass me at this point. but you’re awfully skinny too! do your parents feed you enough, hmm?”

she turned towards her daughter, jun’s mom giving a small tsk,

“of course we have mom, the boy just burns it off so quickly with his wushu classes and running around with his friends...”

jun was starting to get uncomfortable from his grandma’s cheek pinching and squeezing, but luckily someone came running out from the house and called for his grandma,

“grandma! i finished milking the cow, look how much milk i got!!”

jun’s cousin mei held up a grey bucket full of fresh milk. she didn’t acknowledge jun or his parents’s presence

“oh that’s wonderful mei! but put that down for now, come greet your cousin and your aunt and uncle”.

mei finally turned towards them, snorting at jun,

“hey, it’s junhui. haven’t seen you in a while, but at least i’m still taller than you!!”

she punched his arm a little too hard and showed off her height, she was a good few inches taller than jun. junhui just nodded: he wasn’t in the mood to deal with her just yet. 

as mei said hello to his parents, jun snuck out and wandered around the house, checking out the lush plants and seemingly endless supply of buckets and other farming supplies scattered about. he was just turning a corner where he assumed the animals were, he could hear chickens clucking, when he heard his mom’s voice, 

“junhui!! come back here”

he almost didn’t go: he suddenly felt the urge to explore as much as he could, but he knew he couldn’t cause trouble on the first day, so he ran back.

when he got back, his grandmother was smiling fondly at him,

“i’m so glad you and mei are staying with me for the summer, i could use a lot of help around here. i know that it may seem boring to you, especially with no one your age around, but you’ll get used to the farm life soon! besides, the neighbors’ kids sometimes come to help me, so you’ll get to play with them”.

she pointed north to a barely visible speck in the shape of a house. 

the rest of the evening was spent helping his grandmother and mei make mapo doufu, a spicy tofu and beef dish that was of jun’s favorites whilst his parents took a nap in the bedroom. despite the food and his grandmother’s warm, loving presence, his mind wandered to thinking about exploring the area. since he had lived his entire life in the city, he had never explored nature like this, and now he had a whole summer to.

as they ate dinner, he was beginning to think that this summer may not a snooze fest when he was pulled out of his thoughts by the conversation his grandma and his parents were having, 

“so there’s really no one else around besides the neighbors down the road?”  
“well, not exactly. did you see the river to the east? on the other side of it lives the xu family. they own a lot of land, they’re very rich. i’ve only seen the parents a couple of times, but the neighbors tell me they have a child, i think about junhui’s age. but i’ve never seen him: apparently, they shelter him a lot. they don’t let him go outside much, even with friends. i hear they even home school him”.

jun was suddenly wildly interested. a rich family on the other side of the river with a kid his age? he had to explore there too, even if the river was quite far from his grandma’s house. he was about to ask his grandma if she knew anything else about the xu family, but they had already moved on from the conversation and mei was bragging about some award she got at school.

as jun laid in bed that night, the only noise being the soft buzz of the crickets and the annoying snore of mei on the other side of the room, his mind was full of thoughts. he just couldn’t stop thinking about the xu family, it intrigued him so much. imagine being so sheltered that your parents don’t let you go play with friends? he wanted to know what this kid was like, and he was determined to meet him by the end of the summer.

as a few day passed, he was left alone with mei and his grandma as his parents left for thailand. he was only homesick for a few nights before he got used to sleeping with animal noises, but he did sneak into his grandma’s room and sleep with her on occasion. 

as weeks passed, he barely got the opportunity to fully explore the area as his grandma kept him and mei very busy with maintaining the farm. she was getting quite old, she couldn’t do it all on her own. for his grandma’s sake, he put up with bossy mei and her teachings of how to milk a cow, catch chickens, harvest crops, and plant new ones. 

as a couple of months passed, he only saw the neighbor’s kids twice: but they were around mei’s age, so even if they didn’t mean to, they frequently left jun out when they played. jun didn’t really care though, it gave him the opportunity to explore. he went far, but not far enough to where the river was clearly visible. each time he thought he would, mei would tell him to not be stupid and go so far, to get back to the farm and help his grandma.

before jun knew it, he only had 4 days until his parents would be back to take him home to shenzhen. he felt bittersweet about it; sweet because he had overstayed his time here, he desperately missed his parents and friends back home. but bitter because he still hadn’t made his way to the river, still hadn’t even caught a glimpse of the xu family and their mysterious son. he had asked his grandmother a few times if she knew anything more about him, but each time she’d say to stop worrying about them, that they rarely visited this area so his chances of meeting them were slim to none.

but on the third day, he saw a glimmer of hope: there wasn’t anything to be done on the farm, and his grandmother was busy tending to a sick mei.

“jun, go play outside. i don’t want you to catch mei’s cold, but please don’t go far okay? you know better than to run as far as the river, right?”

all jun heard were the words “go play outside”, because this was his chance! no farm responsibilities, no mei to watch over him and tell him not to go far. he just nodded, quickly telling his grandma that he wouldn’t go far. he grabbed a couple of leftover dumplings, stuffed them in his mouth, and raced east towards the river.

he felt free as he ran and ran; he loved to run. even when his legs hurt and he felt his chest tighten, the feeling of freedom he got from it was worth it. he had never gotten to run as far as he was doing now, and before he knew it, he was closer to the river than he had ever been. it was no longer a distant shadow, but a large canal of water that steadily streamed away from the mountains. 

jun entered the forest that surrounded the river, stopping to catch his breath and take in the scenery.

it was serene, the gurgle of the river a background noise for the chirping birds and rustling leaves. it wasn’t heavily wooded, so no chance of any large animals, just small squirrels and rabbits that scurried into burrows as jun passed. 

up ahead, there looked to be a clearing. wondering what could be there, he ran towards it, but stopped dead at the sight of something unexpected: the figure of someone crouched near a small pond. 

he suddenly felt very scared. who could this be?? there’s no one around here: the figure was small, it was a young kid. the neighbor kids were older, and he couldn’t imagine they had ever gone this close to the river.

he didn’t know if he should run and risk the person hearing him, or just confront them. it had to be a kid though, surely he could stand up to them if so: his wushu classes weren’t for nothing.

before he could decide what to do, the figure stood up. terrified, jun couldn’t move. he just watched as it turned right towards him....

it was a boy. he was about the same height as jun, but a lot scrawnier. he was skinny yes, but his plump cheeks were an indication that he was well-fed. he wore expensive-looking jeans, black sneakers, and a green windbreaker.

before jun could say anything, the boy suddenly shouted,

“who are you??”

his voice didn’t exactly match his appearance: even though he spoke mandarin, his voice had a slight accent. it was sweet, but his tone was angry: he wasn’t afraid of jun the same way jun was afraid of him.

jun felt his mouth go dry: he wasn’t used to this, he was normally quite talkative, even to strangers, but his fear had paralyzed him.

the boy walked closer to him, frowning.

“do you speak?? i said, who are you?”

finally, jun sputtered out, 

“i-i’m wen junhui!! w-who are you??”

the boy paused. still frowning, he said,

“i’m xu minghao. i live on the other side of the river, where do you live? i’ve never seen you around”.

a lightbulb flickered on in junhui’s head. xu?? the kid’s last name was xu.... could it be?

was this the xu family’s son?

it had to be. no doubt, he even had expensive clothing on for being out near a swampy pond. he had started to think that the kid didn’t even exist, so his first instinct when he saw him wasn’t that he was the xu family’s son.

but he’s real. and he’s standing in front of jun, looking like he might twist jun’s arm if he doesn’t say something.

“i live down that way”

he pointed towards his grandma’s house, which was a distant dot. minghao turned to look,

“oh, where the old lady lives? did you just move here or something?”  
“well, the lady is my grandma...”

minghao’s expression softened a bit, he stepped away from jun and cocked his head,

“oooohhh, that explains it. well, welcome to the middle of nowhere. why would you come here willingly? there’s really nothing to do. i’ve gotten used to it, since i’m always stuck at home, but my parents left for some stupid party or something so i snuck out. is this your first time here?”

minghao talked fast. jun could barely keep up, but he managed to nod in response to minghao’s last question.

“fun! we can play together!! but you don’t talk very much, that’s okay. i promise i’m fun, i really want to play with someone. my parents don’t let me because they say i don’t need friends, i just need to focus on my studies, but godddd it’s boring. i’m always at home, doing math and studying chinese characters and even english! i hate learning english, it’s so hard”

jun agreed: he hated having to recite english sentences at school. the more minghao talked, the more excited jun got. he would definitely make for a fun person to play with: they had so much nature and land at their disposal to do whatever they wanted, and he thought minghao could probably match his energy level. he started to work up the courage to talk more,

“that sucks, i go to regular school, but trust me, it isn’t much better. it’s only fun when you get to play with your friends. but you don’t know how bored i’ve been since i got here: i haven’t met a single kid my age. how old are you?”

judging based on appearance alone, minghao looked about jun’s age, but the way he talked gave the impression he was younger,

“i’m 8!! i turn 9 in november, what about you?”  
“i’m 9, my birthday was in june.”  
“oh, you’re older than me. that’s okay!”

minghao smiled at him, and jun couldn’t help but smile back. he didn’t know why, but seeing minghao smile was really nice: it made him feel good. that’s stupid though, it was just a smile... 

suddenly, jun remember his initial curiosity upon seeing minghao crouched near the pond, 

“hey, what are you doing at this pond anyway?”

minghao’s face lit up: he flashed an even wider grin that just made junhui happier,

“i was looking for frogs!! you wanna help?”  
“frogs? they’re kinda icky”  
“no they aren’t!! they’re cute! i love frogs, you’ll see after you catch one how cute they are”

and so began their frog hunt. they crouched on the pond’s shore for what seemed, and for what was, hours, only managing to catch two frogs, but jun could see why minghao found them cute. the way they hopped from lily pad to lily pad and swam in the clear water was oddly charming. 

the sun was beginning to set on the horizon as minghao stood up and announced that he had to leave,

“i think my parents will be home soon, and i don’t want them to know i was here. listen, i can sneak out of the house again tomorrow, but at a different time, probably around 10 am. meet me back here? we don’t have to hunt for frogs if you want, we could do other things”

minghao grinned, and jun stood up too,

“yeah, sure! i don’t have anything to do so i’ll be here. it was fun hunting for frogs though”  
“yeah. see why i like them? anyway, today was fun. see you tomorrow, junhui!!”

jun waved as minghao ran towards the river, using his long legs to jump on a cluster of rocks that allowed him to cross. as he ran up a hill, he turned back towards jun and waved for a bit before disappearing into the sunset, until he was only a speck that jun watched until he was completely out of sight.

that night, all jun could think about was his time with minghao. he had missed that time with someone his age, and all he wanted to do was go play with him more. 

and play they did. jun raced back towards the pond at 10 am to find minghao wading in the water, his jeans pulled up past his ankles. they hunted for frogs for a bit, but none showed up, so they explored around the area. minghao talked about his life and home schooling experiences, and jun talked about his life in shenzhen and described the city to an excited minghao,

“man, i want to live in the city when i grow up. you know what i’m gonna be jun? i’m gonna be a dancer: i love dancing. i do wushu, and my teacher also knows how to b-boy, so he’s been teaching me a little and it’s really fun. i wanna be a famous dancer in beijing!!”

jun hadn’t thought much about what he wanted to be when he was older. he liked to act, his parents had auditioned him for a couple of commercials, and he landed some minor roles in them, providing a good source of income for his parents, but nothing serious yet. maybe he could be a famous actor and minghao a famous dancer: how cool would that be?

when jun talked about his home life, he talked about it like it was all in the past. he said his parents were on vacation, which was true, but he never mentioned that he didn’t live at his grandma’s permanently. he didn’t want to feel like the time minghao and him had was limited, even if it was. he liked hanging out with him so much, he didn’t want him to know that they might not get to again for a while. 

and so the days passed and the boys spent every second that they could together. they ran around and saw who could run the fastest and the farthest, played in the pond and river, and made up their own games using their big imaginations. it was the most fun jun had ever had; minghao was so easy to hang out with, and when he went back to his grandma’s house, all he wanted to do was go back out to play with him. 

it was like they were connected by a string. like they had known each other in a past life, and fate, the string, had brought them together. 

jun had heard of the story of the red string of fate before. but he didn’t take it too seriously: what even was fate anyway?

on the final day, they decided to go up to jun’s grandma’s house. jun wanted minghao to meet his grandma, and he was excited for minghao to stand up to bossy mei. 

as they neared the humble abode, laughing and joking around, jun saw a car parked in the driveway and two very familiar figures talking to his grandma. like a truck, it hit him: he had to leave.

he had completely forgotten this was the final day. he had planned on telling minghao beforehand, but he didn’t realize that their time was already up.

jun wanted to pull minghao away and turn around, to go back to the river and catch more frogs forever, but they were too close: his parents had seen him already,

“junhui!! oh jun we’ve missed you so much, come here baby”

his mom opened her arms for a hug, smiling widely, but jun stood still. minghao looked at junhui’s mom, then back at him

“is that... your mom? i thought she was on vacation with your dad?”

jun said nothing. his stomach felt like it swallowed a hundred pound weight. 

at the beginning of the summer, he wanted nothing more than to leave this place, to go back to the familiarity of the city.  
but now as it ends, all he wants is to stay here with minghao. 

“who’s that with you jun? is that the neighbor’s kid?”

his mom fixated on minghao, smiling widely at him. jun’s grandma turned towards the two boys with a confused expression,

“that... that’s not one of the kids. jun, who is that??”

jun thought they were being a bit rude, minghao’s right here and they’re acting like he can’t hear them, but minghao answered for him,

“i’m xu minghao m’am. i live on the other side of the river, my parents own a lot of land here.”

jun’s parents and his grandma looked at each other. his grandma said,

“oh, you’re the xu family’s son....? well, nice to meet you sweetheart. i’m glad you’ve made friends with junhui, he’s needed someone to play with”

suddenly, his dad stepped forward, looking only at jun,

“well i’m glad you made a friend here jun, but it’s time to go. tell your friend that you can see each other next summer, you can exchange phone numbers too”

minghao whipped around to stare at jun,

“what does he mean it’s time to go? go where? you live here jun!!”

jun felt the urge to cry, but he knew he had to say something, so he took a deep breath and faced minghao, 

“minghao..... i lied. i don’t live here, i still live in shenzhen. i was only here for the summer. i’m sorry that i didn’t tell you before, but i wanted to play with you for longer, i didn’t want to tell you that i had to leave so soon after we just started being friends....”

jun looked down, feeling his eyes welling up with tears, but suddenly, he felt a hand grab his shoulder. he looked up, 

“wait here okay? please don’t leave yet, i have something to give to you, it’s really important!!”

minghao looked at jun’s family and nodded before sprinting faster than jun had ever seen him run towards the river. 

jun looked at his family, his dad saying,

“he better be back soon, we have to leave in 15 minutes junhui”.

jun prayed minghao made it back in time: 15 minutes was cutting it short. 

13 minutes later, junhui saw a small figure running towards the house, something in its hand

minghao stopped in front of jun, panting, but in his hands was a large stuffed frog

he handed it to jun,

“i won this at a fair. it’s my favorite stuffed animal, and i want you to have it. that way, you’ll never forget about me! you won’t, right?”

jun took it. it was soft, the frog’s face was cute. he held onto it, staring, before giving minghao a big hug. he wasn’t expecting it, but after a bit, he hugged back too,

“minghao, thank you... i won’t forget you, how could i? you made me love frogs, and you made this summer the best summer ever. we’ll hang out again soon, okay?”

they broke apart, but jun felt a large hand grab his shoulder,

“say thank you to minghao, it’s time to go now”

junhui’s dad pulled him away, but minghao followed. jun said his goodbyes to his grandma, who promised to let minghao use her old landline phone to call jun before going to lay down in her house: she hadn’t been feeling well these past few days. finally, not voluntarily, jun hugged mei goodbye.

as jun got into the backseat of the car, minghao tapped on the window. jun rolled it down, 

“hey, i’ll call you on friday okay? my parents are mad at me because they figured out i was sneaking out of the house, so i’m probably gonna be grounded for a while. but i promise i’ll call okay? have fun in shenzhen!! catch a bunch of frogs for me!!”

minghao flashed his bright smile, small dimples appearing on the corners of his mouth. jun felt that happiness again, and smiled even brighter. 

as the car drove away, junhui laughed at minghao attempting to run alongside the car, waving at him after he stopped. he waved until minghao was not minghao, but a dot standing on a dirt road, then they turned a corner and he was no more.

driving on the same dirt road as he had months earlier, his stomach bubbled again. this time, he didn’t eat too much ice cream and had to throw up. he felt excitement: he had made a new best friend.

-

that friday, jun waited patiently by the phone. he waited all day, but the phone stayed silent. so he waited the next day. and the next, and the next until his parents sat him down and told him that jun’s grandma had passed away after a sudden heart attack. they couldn’t attend the funeral because of money constraints. jun cursed himself for not getting minghao’s number, surely he knew his parent’s number, even if they wouldn’t let him make phone calls. he continued to hold out hope that one day, minghao would call, even if he knew that he didn’t know jun’s number: they had relied on minghao going to his grandma’s house to call. her tragic, unexpected death had changed everything. using only his knowledge of his late grandma’s address, jun attempted to look up the xu family, but no results ever came up.

as months passed, jun began to forget about the boy he shared the final days of summer with. the frog plushie was stuffed in his closet, as the memories that came from it were too sad for jun. that, and he was getting older: he didn’t want to look lame and have stuffed animals displayed in his room. 

over the years, the plushie was forgotten, and jun’s memories of minghao faded.

they never did get to play together again.

the string tangles up.


	2. yr 2- 2009

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “please welcome xu minghao to our homeroom class”
> 
> even when he heard footsteps walking into the classroom, he continued to pick at his scab: harder this time.
> 
> “you can introduce yourself to the class”
> 
> finally, jun looked up. 
> 
> a skinny boy with big, frog-like eyes stood at the front of the room, his expression neither scared nor happy. it was completely indifferent, jun couldn’t really read him at all, which kind of terrified him. 
> 
> jun thought his people reading-skills were pretty good; he did spend a lot of time watching and observing, but not actually talking. probably why a lot of people found him weird. but it frustrated him that minghao showed little to no emotion in his face. 
> 
> he wore the school uniform, but somehow managed to make it look cool and stylish. maybe it was his posture: jun noticed he stood straight. 
> 
> “i’m xu minghao. i wasn’t really prepared to come here actually... but i’m here, i guess. i hope i can make some cool friends.”
> 
> when he spoke, his voice was a little higher pitched than jun expected. he had a slight accent when he spoke, which jun found cute. 
> 
> cute?? what was wrong with him....

“... so, it’s junhui’s turn to do this problem...”  
“...”  
“i said, it’s junhui’s turn to do this problem.”  
“...”  
“... JUNHUI!”

jun sprung awake from the stinging pain of something whacking his hand. blinking, he looked up to see his math teacher, face scrunched into a scowl and arms crossed, ruler in hand, 

“that’s the second time you’ve been asleep in my class, junhui. you’re lucky i’ve been letting it slide, one more time and it’s detention for a whole week.”

jun’s ears felt warm as the rest of the class snickered, all eyes on him. normally, he’d be mortified, but he wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep, he was having a pleasant dream...

his teacher motioned to the chalkboard in front of the room, where a fractions problem was written, 

“don’t make me repeat myself a fourth time. go do the problem on the board, now.”

still blinking away sleepiness, jun slid out of his seat and shuffled to the board. as he passed, he heard the not-actually-quiet whispers of the other students, 

“...what’s up with him?”  
“he’s a year behind and sleeping in class, he should be ashamed...”  
“bet he’ll get the problem wrong”  
“it’s a shame, he’s got no brains behind that cute face....”

he heard a cluster of girls shriek and giggle, his teacher telling them to be quiet as he stopped in front of the board, assessing the problem.

he had no clue how to do it: he obviously hadn’t been paying attention to the teacher’s explanation. once again, he’s forced to look dumb in front of his peers.

he felt his stomach flutter, his palms clamming up with sweat; now that his just-woke-up sleepy daze had faded, the reality of the situation began to sink in. but he couldn’t start hyperventilating again and risk embarassing himself further by needing to step out into the hallway. god, he was a wreck...

he heard a snarky voice up front declare,

“teacher, i don’t think he knows how to do the problem”  
“let’s give him a chance. if not, i’ll call someone else up.”

“you really shouldn’t be giving me a chance....”,

thought junhui. no matter how long he stood up here, he’d never be able to do it. 

“just pick up the chalk, write something!”

jun’s thoughts were logical, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it: he was too stuck between looking dumb by doing the problem wrong and looking dumb by not writing anything down. luckily, his teacher walked up to him,

“alright, junhui, you can go back to your seat. please be awake for the explanation next time. who thinks they can do this problem?”

jun watched as nearly the entire class shot their hand up as he walked back to his seat. ears fiery red, he sat down and picked at the scab forming on his knee. 

after class was their first break, so as the rest of the students hurried out, jun shuffled out of his seat, prepared for his teacher to call him back, which she promptly did,

“junhui, come here for a minute.”

he walked up to her desk, purposefully avoiding eye contact. 

“i’m worried about you. why are you falling asleep in class? it’s like this year you just fell off, and i don’t entirely understand why. your teachers from primary school had nothing but praise for you: you got along with all the kids, were a hard worker, did well on assessments. please, try to care a little more about your education, okay?”

jun had heard this talk from nearly every other teacher, but this was the second time from her, so he appreciated the effort she put it. but he knew that he couldn’t live up to what they wanted him to be: what they thought his potential was. 

lord knows he’d do anything to be that spunky, confident kid he once was.

as he walked out into the field, kids were huddled in small group all around. he spotted his friends waving him over. even if he wasn’t in the mood to talk to them now, he didn’t want to stand alone and look lame, so he went over,

“dude, where were you? break’s gonna be over in like 10 minutes”  
“sorry, math teacher held me back to talk”  
“ooh, isn’t your math teacher the hot one? what about?”

his friends laughed and hit each other’s arms, jun feeling uncomfortable and awkward as he stood there watching them, forcing out a fake smile. what was funny about this?

he waited until they were done before talking,

“i fell asleep in class again, so she was just scolding me”  
“man, i’d kill to be scolded by her”  
“you know junhui wouldn’t, guys a little pussy when it comes to girls”

they continued to laugh until one of his friends, yanan, told them to be quiet,

“guys, it’s not funny anymore, let’s just move on”

yanan smiled kindly at jun, who let out his first genuine smile of the day. 

the rest of the day was boring and monotonous as usual, jun nearly flew out of his seat as soon as he heard the last bell ring. he raced out to the bike rack and was wheeling out his bike when he head his name being called,

“junhui!! wait up!!”

he would’ve biked away if he didn’t recognize the voice as being yanan’s,

“hey, let’s bike home together. i’m pretty sure our apartment complexes are only like, 5 minutes away from each other”

yanan pulled his bike up next to jun’s, smiling at him before climbing on. 

jun loved riding his bike. even if it wasn’t the most convenient in a city, it was faster than walking, and his parents didn’t want him taking the subway yet. he loved pushing at the pedals until his legs were sore, he’s always loved to go fast and push his body to his limit. 

riding his bike to and from school was often the only alone time jun got, thus, he treasured it. no talking to others and being drained by their conversations, no feeling stupid because he didn’t know what to say. just him, his bike, and the non-stop, but always entertaining, city zooming behind him. 

but he liked yanan. he was the only person he truly considered a friend, the rest were just people he talked to at school to not be alone. so out of anyone that could’ve asked to butt in on his alone time, he was glad it was yanan, 

“yeah, sure. let’s go”

jun began pedaling, yanan following. they biked in silence for a minute or so until yanan started conversation,

“hey, i hope they didn’t make you feel too uncomfortable. you know, back during break. they’re stupid like that: don’t take it too personally okay?”

jun wished he didn’t get so uncomfortable when talking about love, crushes, or just about anything romantic. it was so stupid: he was 13 and acted like a kid who still thought people had cooties. 

he just didn’t really understand it. when all his friends would talk about the girls in their class that they found pretty, or their girlfriends, or their first kisses, jun just felt nothing. sure, he understood why they found them pretty, but he didn’t feel that.... attraction. he didn’t get it, but he knew something was different about him. and different was bad. 

“no, it’s fine... i just didn’t know what to say”  
“i wouldn’t either. why were you sleeping in class anyway? that isn’t a very junhui think to do”

junhui thought carefully before answering yanan’s question. the real answer was that jun had decided to stop trying in school, and since math bored him to tears, he let himself fall asleep. but not trying in school was just asking for people to call him lazy. which he guessed he was. 

but he really did try. well, emphasis on the did part. he studied, he took notes and rewrote them over and over again until his hand began to cramp. 

jun decided to mix the truth with a white lie,

“math bores me to tears dude, i didn’t mean to fall asleep. i didn’t get much sleep last night anyway”  
“i get you, i just never pictured you as the type to fall asleep in class is all. you know, with you being the studious type and always doing all your homework”

“yet, i’m still one grade level below where i should be....”

jun thought, but didn’t say out loud. he didn’t want yanan to feel obligated to say something: like usual, he kept his anxieties and worries to himself.

before they knew it, they were at jun’s apartment complex. yanan’s was up ahead, so they said their goodbyes and jun biked up to the bike rack, locking it up as slowly as he could to enjoy his last few moments of peace. 

“jun!! i’m hungry!!”

he had barely opened the door before a small figure came running at him. his little brother yang yang stood in front of him, hands on hips.

“why are you home late?”  
“i’m not, you’re just hungry too early”  
“no i’m not!!”

he was too tired to have this conversation; he quickly heated up the leftovers in the fridge and put them in front of his brother, who was already sitting at the table. as he ate, jun escaped to his room.

it wasn’t even technically his room, and it showed from all the toys strewn about, spilling over into jun’s side of the room. he didn’t even bother to pick them up, just pushing yang yang’s toys to the side before laying in his bed and staring at the ceiling.

his little brother was nearly 10 years younger than him, and he was definitely an accident; jun understood that by now. his parents weren’t financially ready to have another kid, thus, they still lived in the dingy apartment jun had grown up in. he remembers as a kid thinking his apartment was the best place in the world: he had his own room, so many toys, and the park right across from their complex, so he could go play with his friends anytime he wanted. 

now he couldn’t wait to get out of here. he loved his brother, but on top of having to share a room with him, everything was about him; his parents focused all their attention on him. jun sometimes felt like he was an afterthought.

not to mention that he was expected to look after yang yang while his parents stayed late at work. they didn’t want to pay for daycare, especially since jun came home only 5 minutes after him, and their neighbor looked after his brother in that time. jun had to prepare him dinner, help him with schoolwork, and keep him entertained (that was the hardest part).

but he knew he had to care for his brother, especially recently, as their parents had been fighting more openly. they had been going through marital issues for years, but now they didn’t even try to hide it. he was the one to cover his crying brother’s ears and tell him it was okay, trying to hold back his own tears as his parents screamed and argued with each other. it often ended in his dad storming out of the house and his mom crying on the floor. even if it scared him to death, jun knew he had to be strong for yang yang and not let him see him cry. 

junhui could’ve laid in bed forever if he didn’t hear the cry of his little brother asking for more rice. he got up, fed him more, and turned the tv on to cartoons to keep him occupied. even if he didn’t want to, as he walked back to his room, he figured he might as well start on his homework. 

as jun sat at his desk, staring at math problems, his mind couldn’t help but wander. 

as a kid, jun was a good student. he didn’t really like learning, but he was a hard worker and managed to get ahead of his class. his parents were very proud: they pushed him to go ahead of his grade level, even invested in a tutor for him. he was beloved by his teachers for not only his grades, but his politeness, positivity, and spunky attitude that came out when he played with his friends: he was always the jokester among his friend group.

but as he got older and entered middle school, and the tests and homework got harder, jun began to slip through the cracks. coupled with intense anxiety as a result from pressure that he put on himself and was put on him by seemingly everyone else, including his parents, teachers, and peers, jun’s hard-working attitude only took him so far. no matter how long he studied for a test, he would do mediocre at best. he couldn’t answer a question when called on, even if he knew it, out of a fear he’d get it wrong and look stupid.

it all culminated last year, when jun failed both his math and biology class. his parents were furious at him, they couldn’t believe their sweet, bright son could fail two classes. they demanded the principal held him back a year, against jun’s pleads; he was mortified at the thought of being with kids a year younger than, and what everyone would think.

at first, jun tried his best. he thought that if he got good grades in his classes, they’d move him back up. but lately, it’s as if he didn’t have it in him to care about anything. what was the point of trying if he never grew, if he always was mediocre at best?

that’s why he let himself fall asleep in class. even if yanan was right; it wasn’t a junhui thing to do at all.

but jun was tired of living up to everyone’s expectations. tired of everyone wanting him to be the good, studious boy they thought he was. what did they know anyway? what did they know about him, only he knew who the “real” junhui was anyway....

jun wished that one day, he could meet someone that didn’t hold up to such high standards. that would like him for him: mediocre and all.

the next morning, as jun biked to school, his anxieties felt heightened. the knot in his stomach seemed to be pulled tighter today, which completely contrasted the gorgeous weather.

it was a crisp late-october morning. the leaves had changed color, and they crunched under jun’s bike’s tires. the occasional breeze sent a shiver up jun’s spine, his hands soon began to feel cold; he should’ve brought gloves. 

normally, this was jun’s favorite weather. but he couldn’t help but feel like he was anticipating something. 

“great,” jun thought, “just my luck for two bad days in a row”.

8 am. first class of the day: homeroom. as usual, jun was picking at the scab on his knee. it was getting nastier, but he couldn’t help but pick it; it gave him a weird satisfaction.

finally, his homeroom teacher walked into the room. the class was still chatty, but after the teacher cleared his throat, the classroom immediately fell silent.

“class, we have a new student joining us today. they come from liaoning.”

a buzz spread throughout the room,

“liaoning?? that’s way up north”  
“who would transfer from all the way up there?”  
“do you think they’re rich??”

jun doubted the last one, this was a public school in a big city: most of the kids who attended were on the lower end of the middle class. 

but the fact the the new student was from liaoning intrigued him. that’s where his grandmother used to live, he think he visited her once, but his memories were hazy. lately, it’s been harder for him to recall events from his childhood. maybe it was a side effect of his anxieties and stress...

“please treat him with respect, moving to a new school, especially when the year has already begun, is stressful enough”

jun continued to pick at his scab.

“please welcome xu minghao to our homeroom class”

even when he heard footsteps walking into the classroom, he continued to pick at his scab: harder this time.

“you can introduce yourself to the class”

finally, jun looked up. 

a skinny boy with big, frog-like eyes stood at the front of the room, his expression neither scared nor happy. it was completely indifferent, jun couldn’t really read him at all, which kind of terrified him. 

jun thought his people reading-skills were pretty good; he did spend a lot of time watching and observing, but not actually talking. probably why a lot of people found him weird. but it frustrated him that minghao showed little to no emotion in his face. 

he wore the school uniform, but somehow managed to make it look cool and stylish. maybe it was his posture: jun noticed he stood straight. 

“i’m xu minghao. i wasn’t really prepared to come here actually... but i’m here, i guess. i hope i can make some cool friends.”

when he spoke, his voice was a little higher pitched than jun expected. he had a slight accent when he spoke, which jun found cute. 

cute?? what was wrong with him....

minghao smiled, and little dimples appeared at the corners. jun felt himself fixate on them. not to mention he almost smiled back at him, jesus...

“you can take a seat right there, minghao”

as minghao walked to his seat, jun saw a cluster of girls at the front look at him and giggle.

he watched minghao walk closer... and closer until he realized the seat next to him was empty and oh my god that’s where he’s going to sit. 

jun didn’t look away from minghao fast enough; as he took his seat, the two locked eyes. again, jun couldn’t read his expression, but he saw a hint of confusion in minghao’s eyes. almost as if he was surprised to see jun. 

but he was sure they had never met. even if his name sounded vaguely familiar, jun figured he probably used to go to another school in the area, or was a friend of a friend. 

jun hurried out of homeroom, but he saw minghao hang back to talk to a couple kids. 

minghao made him anxious. he didn’t like it.

luckily, he knew he couldn’t have any classes with him, seeing as jun was a year behind his peers (homeroom consisted of people in the same year: it was organized by last name)

but.... his english class was at the grade level, since he was required to take it and it only started to be taught at jun’s grade level. 

the class was at the end of the day too, so jun spent the day praying that minghao wasn’t put in the same english class, but he knew it was futile; he had the worst luck in the world. 

at break, him and his friends gossiped about the new student,

“i hear he’s real rich. when i get home i’ll ask my dad if he knows about the xu family: he’s into business and stuff, he’ll probably know”  
“why do you think he transferred to this school then??”  
“maybe his family went bankrupt? or they moved business down to shenzhen”  
“all the girls are already all over him: they think he’s cute”

jun said nothing as usual, just listening. even if he decided that he didn’t like minghao, he had to admit, these rumors made him mildly interested in why he was at this school.

yanan caught jun’s eye and flashed a small smile. jun barely managed to return it: he was even getting bad at faking smiles. how pathetic.

jun walked slow to his english class, trying to prolong finding out whether or not minghao was in the class.

finally, he stepped in.

he was about to exhale in relief, for he didn’t see him on first glance, but as he walked to a seat in the back, his stomach churned

there he was. sitting right at the back, arms crossed, talking to a girl. 

just... junhui’s... luck. 

jun wanted to look for another seat, but he was already in front of the one next to minghao, he’d look rude if he turned around.

so, he was stuck. he set down his backpack and slid into the seat, not looking at minghao.

class started, and jun zoned out until he heard the words “partner project”,

“today you will be starting a partner project. you will do a profile on a famous chinese-american of your choice: all in english! details will be on this paper that i am about to pass out”

jun wanted to groan out loud: a partner project?? it was his worst nightmare, especially since he didn’t have any of his friends in the class. his teacher went on,

“your partners will be randomly assigned, come see me after class to find out who your partner is”

jun scanned the paper his teacher gave him. it was due friday?! today was tuesday! 

he hoped his partner was a hard worker...

at the end of class, jun hurried out the door before remembering he had to find out who his partner was. he was turning back when he bumped into someone.

minghao stepped back, looking straight at jun,

“watch where you’re going”

jun felt this throat close: why was it suddenly so hard to speak? he was about to mutter out a sorry when minghao asked,

“are you junhui?”

jun just nodded. 

“ooh, i figured. well, we’re partners for this project thing.”

could this day get any worse??

luckily, minghao did most of the talking,

“so can i come over to your house, like, now? this project is due so soon, let’s just get it over with”

even if the the last thing in the world he wanted was for minghao to come to his house, he felt like he didn’t have a choice. besides, maybe they could finish it all tonight so minghao didn’t have to visit further.

and so, once again, jun’s bike ride home was not as peaceful as wanted it to be. minghao seemed to take the subway or was driven to school, jun was too scared to ask, since he didn’t have a bike. thus, they walked as jun wheeled his bike. 

they walked in silence, which was surprising for jun; he pegged minghao as the type to talk incessantly, just to fill the silence. jun welcome this. for all his anxieties and social awkwardness, he never found silence to be particularly awkward, he rather enjoyed it.

jun prayed that his little brother wouldn’t be too rowdy today as he unlocked the door to his apartment, but of course, he came bounding towards them,

“jun!! you’re late again!!”

yang yang stopped when he noticed minghao,

“who’s that??”

he frowned as jun sighed, saying,

“he’s.... a friend from school. we have to do a project together, so you’ll have to stay a little quiet today okay yang yang?”

he turned sheepishly to minghao, who was still as expressionless as ever,

“sorry... about that. i need to heat up his dinner, you can go into my room, it’s the first room on the left....”

minghao just nodded, disappearing into his room, leaving jun even more confused about minghao and his intentions. 

he quickly served yang yang his dinner, turning on one of his favorite movies before hurrying into his room, hoping minghao didn’t find anything too embarrassing. 

he found minghao sitting on his bed, holding an unfamiliar frog stuffed animal.

minghao looked up as jun walked in, his brows furrowed,

“is this your brother’s?”

jun supposed it was. his brother had too many toys as it was, that frog was probably one of the countless plushies he received on his birthday or christmas. 

“i guess, it wouldn’t be mine... where did you find it?”  
“it was on the floor, but it’s kinda weird, since i remember having one exactly like this as a kid. it was my favorite stuffed animal too.... i wonder what ever happened to it”

jun shrugged,

“maybe they sell them in some store”  
“probably”

minghao put the frog on his brother’s bed, and jun realized what a mess the room was. his brother’s toys were all over, clothes in a pile near the closet, and his side wasnt much better. 

jun remembered that rumor that minghao’s family was rich.

he quickly shoved some toys in the large chest at the foot of yang yang’s bed,

“sorry for the mess, my brother doesn’t really know how to clean up after himself....”  
“it’s fine dude, i don’t care”

jun stood up and faced minghao, who had moved to sitting at his desk chair. he again, was unreadable, but jun could see the side of mouth curling up a bit.

“let’s just start on this project”

they worked for a bit before inevitably getting distracted, as minghao suddenly asked,

“where are your parents?”  
“at work. they both work late, you probably won’t get to see them”  
“so you have to take care of your little brother?”

jun nodded. minghao raised his brows,

“wow, that’s pretty impressive. i’m an only child, i couldn’t imagine having to take care of a little brother like that....”

and minghao smiled at him. it was like the one jun had seen earlier in the day, when he had introduced himself during homeroom, but it was softer this time. it sent butterflies loose in junhui’s stomach, and he felt a weird deja vu moment. probably from minghao’s smile earlier in the day. 

“yeah, well i’ve gotten used to it. i wish i was an only child though”  
“trust me, it isn’t as fun as a lot of kids think it is. well, my parents are really strict with me, so they don’t let me hang out with other kids much. having an older brother sounds cool, you know?”

jun liked to watch minghao as he talked. he was getting more comfortable, and suddenly he didn’t seem like the scary new kid who might be really rich. 

“yeah, i’d wanna have an older brother... maybe even a sister”  
“how old are you by the way?”

jun thought this question was a bit weird, seeing as most, if not all the kids in his grade were 13. you kinda had to be at their grade level. but he answered it nonetheless,

“13, why?”  
“see, i’m still 12. but my birthday is next week, the 7th. i’m a grade ahead since i think i’m like.... considered a genuies”

minghao laughed, jun genuinely laughed along. he couldn’t remember the last time he had actually laughed with someone...

“no but really, that sounds bad, but my parents and teachers tell me i’m a prodigy. i do really well in school and stuff, so they decided to put me a year ahead. i’ve been asking around to see if there’s anyone else like me”

junhui felt his anxieties rise in his tummy again. so minghao was one of those advanced kids.... of course he was. just the opposite of him. 

yet, despite this, jun felt oddly comfortable around him. he expected minghao to be cold and snarky, but his generally likeable demeanor was refreshing. he assumed anyone confident and rich was also arrogant and rude. 

so comfortable, in fact, that he blurted out,

“why did you transfer to our school, by the way?”

minghao smiled again, causing the butterflies to flap their wings even harder in junhui’s stomach. 

minghao paused for a few seconds before answering, 

“i guess i’ll tell the truth. my parents are... pretty rich. they owned a lot of land in liaoning, but now they’re looking to expand to shenzhen. they decided to send me to a ‘normal’ school for a semester, they still live in liaoning, but my dad visits every weekend. my aunt lives in the area, so i’m living with her right now.”

jun could sense that minghao had indeed told him the truth. so the rumors were true....

he decided not to tell anyone this. he had a feeling minghao hadn’t told anyone else this information.

they ended up talking for so long that it turned dark out, and they hadn’t made any more progress on their project.

they agreed to meet again tomorrow, which, to jun’s utter surprise, he was looking forward to.

it was so easy to talk to minghao. they came up with conversation starters left and right, and each and every time they could talk about it. minghao weirdly didn’t talk about himself much, he mostly deflected jun’s questions, which jun found odd. he thought minghao would want to brag about his family’s wealth, isn’t that what rich people do? 

the next day in homeroom, jun was picking at his scab yet again when he felt someone punch his arm. he looked up to see minghao flashing his warm smile at him,

“morning, jun”

jun said good morning back as minghao took his seat. they couldn’t continue to talk, as their teacher had already entered the room, but they passed notes to each other the entire time.

english class was no different. they were given some time in class to work on their project, and whilst they made progress on it, they mostly spent their time playing hangman and paper football across their desks. 

as they talked in jun’s room after school, jun told minghao something he thought he’d never tell anyone, not his friends, not even yanan,

“did you know i used to be in the school plays?”  
“seriously?? when??”

jun felt his ears turn hot as soon as the words “school plays” left his mouth. 

when he was much younger, he starred in a couple of commercials. they weren’t much: his parents just wanted some extra income, and he was cute enough to be casted. but eventually, his parents didn’t have the time to drive him to auditions, so jun’s acting career came to a halt.

but what jun tells no one is that he wishes he still acted. he loved being on set, even if he had one line, he would practice it until he coudl say it in his sleep. he admired the actors in his favorite movies, how they could play the role of someone completely fictional so beautifully. in recent years, it’s been something that he’s seriously considering going into as a career.

before jun’s anxiety kicked in, he auditioned for all the school plays and got leads in nearly all of them. he was famous in his elementary school for his dramatic performances, and he loved the attention, he loved the praise from everyone, especially his parents.

but now, the thought of being on stage terrified him. he knew he would freeze up there, forget his lines, look stupid, probably cry because he cried easily. 

he just didn’t want to deal with all that. even if he went to every school play and musical, admiring the actors, occasionally imagining how he would play a certain role. 

what no one, not even minghao, knows is that even more recently, jun took up singing. he’s always enjoyed music, and when he discovered musical movies, he was obsessed. it was all he watched: he was amazed that these amazing actors could also sing so beautifully.

and so, without any formal training, jun would sneak out into the park near his apartment complex to sing. every night, for months, he’d put in his headphones listen to his favorite songs, and sing along. he read anything he could about vocal techniques, how to control his breathing, how to keep tone and pitch. 

but he’d never show anyone his singing. and as he grew older and had more responsibilities at school and at home, his free time shrunk to little to no time to himself. thus, his passions were put on pause, and jun had not sang nor acted in almost a year. 

he missed it. he really did, but what stopped him from taking it more seriously were his parents. he knew that being an actor or singer isn’t the most stable career path he could choose, and he doubts his parents would approve even if he had talent. 

junhui considered telling minghao more. that he not only loved to act, but sing, that he dreamt of becoming a famous actor or singer, or both. 

but he wasn’t there yet. so he told minghao about being in school plays in elementary school, which minghao got a kick out of,

“i can’t imagine you being an actor, no offense. you’re too quiet”  
“i was a lot different as a kid”  
“i guess that makes sense. but you should audition for this year’s; i’d go see you”

the next day at school, jun took an information flyer from the drama teacher about the school play. 

and so the week went on. sometimes, jun would just stare at minghao. not even really listening to what he was saying, just looking at his big bright eyes, button nose, or the tooth on his bottom jaw that was still growing in. 

he couldn’t stop thinking about minghao. when he was laying in bed at night, trying to fall asleep, all he thought about was minghao and his smile. when minghao touched his arm, his heart raced. once, when minghao talked about having crushes and asked if jun liked anyone in their class, jun’s ears turned bright red and he had to quickly excuse himself to the bathroom, too embarrassed to say anything.

what was wrong with him??

slowly, he was learning more and more about minghao. he learnt that he liked to dance, that he did wushu, that his parents wanted him to go into business like his dad, but he just wanted to be a professional dancer. he excelled in academics, even if he could care less about them. 

his favorite food was baozi, or bao, which he named his pet frog after. as he was telling jun about his odd but strangely cute obsession with frogs, he suddenly asked,

“i’m gonna have a bunch of kids from school over tomorrow at my house. do you wanna come?? my aunt’s gonna make a lot of bao! you can meet my frog too!”

junhui was nervous at first. he rarely hung out with his friends, so he didn’t know how he’d fit in, especially since most kids at school didn’t really like him. but minghao seemed to really want jun to come, and he did want to meet bao the frog, so he agreed,

“okay, what time?”  
“at 1. it’s also kinda like my early birthday party since it’s in a week”

after minghao left (at this point, they had already finished their project... minghao was just there to hang out), jun thought about what to give minghao for his birthday. he didn’t plan for this, and he knew his parents wouldn’t take him to buy something, but he wanted it to be special.

because jun really liked minghao. he liked him so much that sometimes, he wanted to kiss him. and junhui had never kissed anyone before, never even thought about it. but he’d seen couples on tv do it, and he wanted to do it with minghao. he knew it was something that people did when they liked each other, since his friends did it with their girlfriends.

he had a thought. 

could.... minghao and him be like them? like his friends and their girlfriends? but they were two boys. he didn’t know if he could have a boyfriend, since minghao was also a boy. 

the more he thought about it, the more he saw no reason he couldn’t be minghao’s boyfriend. he really liked minghao, so that means they should date, right?

with that, junhui knew what he had to do.

tomorrow, at minghao’s birthday party, he would ask him to be his boyfriend.

-

right as jun was about to fall asleep that night, he remembered an old legend his mom used to tell him. about the red string of fate. it’s said that two people were bound by this string for life, and they were brought together by fate. the string could never break either, so they were eternally bound together. 

jun thought two people must really like each other to be connected by like that. he wondered if him and minghao were connected by the string. maybe fate brought them together.

but that’s kinda stupid. what’s fate anyway? it only existed in movies and books.

-

“i’ll be back at 3, okay? have fun junhui. be good”

he thanked his mom before stepping out of the car, waving as she drove away. 

he turned to face the large apartment complex in front of him.

it was in a much nicer area than where junhui lived, even if it was all in the same city of shenzhen. 

the area was cleaner, no sketchy back alleys or scary people who shouted weird stuff in the streets. and the apartments were huge: they were like houses. 

taking a deep breath, he loosened his grip on his bag a bit. 

he had gotten minghao two things. first, he asked his mom where they sold the best bao, and he used all of his allowance money to buy as many as he could. not before buying the cutest frog plushie he could find; it wasn’t the same as his brother’s, the one minghao had as a kid, but it was as good as jun could get. 

he hoped minghao liked it. 

minghao lived on the third floor, so he walked up the stairs, his heart beating out of his chest. he didn’t want to be nervous: he was excited to hang out with minghao and give him his presents. and to ask him to be his boyfriend.

but he was nervous about that. surely minghao would say yes.... right? he thought minghao might feel the same. he talked with him so comfortably, so openly, always touching him and flashing jun his warm smile...

as junhui walked down the hallway, looking for apartment 8, he heard voices coming from one up ahead. he walked faster towards it, and sure enough, it was apartment 8.

he took a deep breath and reached out to ring the doorbell, but he suddenly heard a very familiar voice. 

it was one of his friends from school, 

“so you’ve been hanging out with jun a lot. why? he’s kinda weird...”

before jun could even process what he heard, the laughter of kids filled his ears,

another voice said,

“yeah, he’s a year behind everyone and he doesn’t even try in school anymore. i heard as a kid he was good in school, but now it’s like he’s given up. and he doesn’t talk to anyone: he just stares at them. it’s so weird!!”  
“you know he hasn’t had his first kiss yet? or even held hands with a girl? it’s pathetic!”  
“you know what that means...”  
“he’s gay.”  
“totally. bet he has a crush on you minghao, he stares at you so creepily!”

jun was completely frozen. his heart was pumping harder than it had ever pumped, he wanted to run, to run far far away but he couldn’t. he was just frozen. 

to his horror, he heard minghao’s voice,

“you think he is gay? i don’t think he likes me though. but if he did, i’d stop hanging out with him. i don’t want to associate myself with someone like him”  
“thank god you’re like, sane. it’s too bad too, jun’s actually like, cute. maybe if he was smarter he’d be more popular...”

jun ran down the stairs, not even trying to stop the tears from falling. he wanted to run out of the city, it was suddenly too crowded. there was nowhere to go, everyone he looked there were buildings, buildings, stupid buildings!!

jun stood at the edge of the sidewalk, trying to control his tears as he heard a kind voice in front of him,

“sweetheart, are you okay? are you lost?”

jun could only blubber incoherently, so he just shook his head. the voice spoke again,

“do you need to call your parents? you can use my phone, here”

jun looked up to see a little old lady, looking at him with concern, holding out an old flip phone. jun still didn’t have a phone: his parents couldn’t afford one, and they still saw it as unnecessary. 

he thanked the woman, trying to pull himself together as he typed in his mom’s number,

“hello? who is this?”  
“mom, it’s junhui...”  
“jun?? are you okay??”  
“i just... i need to go home. can you come pick me up where you dropped me off...”  
“i might take a little while but of course, are you safe? who’s phone are you calling from?”  
“i’m safe, i borrowed a nice woman’s phone, i just want to go home, this... party isn’t for me”  
“i’ll be right there junhui”

he hung up, thanking the woman again as he handed her the phone. 

“i’ll stay right with you until your mother comes to pick you up, okay? can’t have a kid by himself in the city!”

luckily, the lady didn’t ask him any questions. even if all he wanted to do was talk to someone. 

eventually his mom arrived. she thanked the woman before jun slid into the backseat, trying not to show his face to his mom. 

again, she said nothing to him. and for the first time, he wanted her to. he wished he could scream and cry and have someone that would listen.

when they got back home, jun quickly told his mom he’d be at the park for a bit, not even waiting to hear her response before sprinting away, wishing his legs could take him to a different city, a different prefecture, a different country. 

the park was empty, so jun sat at a bench and cried. he cried until his eyes hurt, until he felt so drained he thought he could curl up on the bench and fall asleep right there. 

he hated them. he hated them all. especially minghao. he knew he shouldn’t have trusted him, shouldn’t have gotten so close. he’ll always be the weird kid that no one wants to be friends with, that only talks to him out of pity. i bet minghao was laughing about him to everyone else behind his back the entire time. 

and here jun was thinking he’d be his boyfriend.

what a fucking joke. 

at least he knew what he was now. gay. junhui was gay. but he didn’t want to be. the way they said it.... like it was the worst thing someone could be. 

when he got home, he ate all of the bao he bought and gave the frog plush to yang yang. 

he felt like his heart had been smashed into a million pieces. he didn’t want to look at frogs or even think about them. they were just stupid slimy creatures anyway. not even remotely cute. stupid stupid stupid.

-

minghao was not in homeroom on monday morning. or english class. he wasn’t there on tuesday either. by wednesday, jun had gotten fed up and decided to ask yanan if he knew where minghao was,

“minghao? didn’t you hear? he transferred out of school, apparently his parents wanted him to go back to school in liaoning. weird huh?”

junhui’s stomach dropped like a sinking rock in water. 

minghao... left? just like that? just as suddenly as he appeared, he was gone...

a part of jun was rejoicing. he wouldn’t have to face minghao and pretend like everything was okay, or answer why he didn’t show up at his birthday party, or fake wish him a happy birthday. 

he hated minghao. he was a fake friend. he broke his heart. 

but as the week progressed, junhui missed seeing the boy’s warm smile. his little dimples when he did. his high-pitched giggle that made jun’s heart thump, his love of frogs, of dance, he missed staring at his cute face, of imagining them holding hands or kissing. he hated how much he longed to just see him again. he didn’t even have a photo of him, or a phone number. liaoning was huge. there were probably a million xu families. 

yet, on friday evening, junhui pedaled back to minghao’s aunt’s apartment complex. he stopped and stared. wondering why all the bad things happened to him. 

why he was gay. why he loved minghao. 

-

as the years passed, junhui began to heal from his heartbreak. he moved and started a new life at a new school, where he made better friends. he still kept in touch with yanan though. 

sometimes, he’d see a frog and think of minghao. of his first crush, his first love. 

but those never last anyways. it was doomed from the start, junhui thought. he had long moved on.

the string tangles up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for everyone who’s supported this so far, i really didn’t think it’d get this far but i’m really in love with this story and the characters i’ve created. next chapter will finally get more romantic. i know you hate minghao right now, but i’ll write in his pov soon. he has his reasons


	3. yr 3- 2014 (pt 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> as junhui’s heart continued to beat like a drum in his ears, he realized one thing.
> 
> he was completely, utterly, undoubtedly, 100%, still in love with xu minghao.

gripping the straps of his backpack tightly, until his knuckles turned white, jun walked until he got swept up in the bustling crowd. his stomach churned in anticipation as he caught a glimpse of the sign a few feet away from him,

“any person over the age of 12 must remove their shoes”

he thanked god he had socks on, but he was still hesitant about the idea of them touching the ground. he wondered if some people didn’t wear socks; how gross would that be? putting their bare feet on the ground, just waiting to get some sort of horrible, nasty foot fungus...

jun shuddered just thinking about it. he hated germs.

as the line shuffled forward, jun double, no, triple checked he had his passport and boarding pass. his hand were shaking both from nerves and from gripping the documents so tightly. he couldn’t even imagine losing them, what if they got stepped on? swept up in the crowd? picked up by some unsuspecting kid in a stroller, drooling all over it... or even worse, some shady guy who would use his information to create a fake id for someone.... or stalk him.... kill him...

“snap out of it junhui, you can’t freak out at airport security”

his mom’s sensible voice echoed through his mind, snapping him out of his thoughts. she was right; this was no place to get overly anxious. one wrong look at the guards and they’d pull him to a private room and ask him to pull his pants down or something. would they probe him? not really what jun imagined his first  
would be like...

“hey kid, you alright?”

oh lord. jun stared at the face of a tough airport security man, his eyebrows furrowed. jun hadn’t realized he’d made it to the front of the line, and they had to check his documents. flustered, he pushed his passport and boarding pass to the guard, who took them. after a couple of seconds, he looked up and studied jun,

“flying alone?”  
“yes”  
“internationally?”  
“yes”

the guard “hm’d” before closing jun’s boarding pass into his passport and handing it to him,

“safe travels”  
“thank you”

jun sped walked towards the screening stations, picking the one with the shortest line. god, he had already made a fool of himself at the airport. despite his insistence that he was old enough to fly alone, that he was 17 now, that he was perfectly responsible and mature enough, he now wished his parents and little brother were here for support. even if they wouldn’t be able to board the plane together. 

luckily, the screening went by smoothly. jun made sure to make as little contact with the floor as possible after removing his shoes, wasting no time to slip his feet back into them. 

he sat down at a bench and pulled out his boarding pass. his flight was at gate A17. jun looked up at the signs, exhaling as he saw that the A gates were to the right. thank god he didn’t have to take a bus or something to the other gates, jun was sure he’d have to ask for help to get there and would probably get off at the wrong gate anyway.

he walked carefully down the terminal, making sure he didn’t miss gate 17 whilst also trying not to knock him or his luggage into anyone else. it was a crowded day; jun hadn’t thought of all the families that would be traveling for spring break

15... 16... 17. gate 17. 

there were a fair number of people at the gate, more than jun had thought, considering he was here 3 hours early. he guessed it would be a full flight, which, as long as there weren’t too many screaming babies, he wasn’t too bothered about. 

jun had to pee, so he walked to the bathroom conveniently across his gate. as usual, the men’s restroom didn’t have a long line, but he was suddenly aware of the amount of luggage was he carrying. he couldn’t go into the bathroom with all of them; he was sure there wasn’t enough room. but he couldn’t leave them unattended either... as he stood outside the restrooms, struggling with what to do, a little old lady walked out of the women’s bathroom and looked at him, then at his luggage,

“do you want me to hold those for you while you use the restroom, dear?”

jun hesitated. he knew it wasn’t a smart idea to trust a stranger, but there was something about the woman that made him feel safe, like she was trustworthy

“i don’t have a better option... fuck it”

he thought, then nodded at the woman,

“that would be great, thank you so much. i’ll be quick”

jun handed his luggage to the woman, slipping his phone into his back pocket before hurrying into the bathroom. he pissed, washed his hands thoroughly, then walked out to find the woman looking at him with her mouth slightly open, eyes widened.

“do i have something on my face...”

jun wondered. he was starting to get a little freaked out by her, but he was glad his luggage was (seemingly) safe. he was just about to ask her if she was okay when she spoke,

“i recognize you”

jun stayed silent, but he took a closer look at the woman. she looked like every other little old lady, hell, she could be his grandma for all jun knew, but he had to admit that she was oddly familiar. especially since he inherently trusted her...

“you’re the boy who was crying on the street a few years ago. who i let borrow my phone, i waited with you until your mom came and picked you up!”

the woman laughed, jun awkwardly smiling along. 

just his luck that he’d run into someone who brought such bad memories to his mind. jun had not thought of them in a very long time, and now, he felt his stomach twist as he relived them.

one of the darkest times of his life. when he was at the peak of his anxiousness, insecurities, and confusion. especially about his sexuality; he knew there was something different about him, but he didn’t completely understand what it was until he fell for his “friend”. 

minghao.

his name used to feel like a stab to junhui’s heart, but now, it just feels hollow. he cried enough over him; he didn’t want to give the scumbag the satisfaction of knowing he broke his heart. especially when they were never even friends in the first place, especially when minghao was a homophobic piece of shit who never even cared about jun, much less liked him the same way that jun did.

but in a way, jun was glad it had happened. it toughened him up, matured him, and made him confront the fact that he was gay. 

and slowly, he became more comfortable with it. 

he had even secretly dated a boy at his high school, and had his first kiss, but, sadly, it wasn’t a fond memory. it had been tainted because during it, he started thinking about minghao, and what it would be like to kiss him. horrified, he started hyperventilating and crying, causing his then boyfriend to awkwardly comfort him. since jun couldn’t tell him why he had panicked so much; he had to lie and say he panicked because it was first kiss. 

they didn’t last long, but jun still felt bad. he liked the boy, he did, but the thought that he still wasn’t over minghao both terrified and angered him. minghao was his first love; fleeting, impossible, and childish. they wouldn’t have lasted. they shouldn’t have lasted anyway; minghao was a bad person. 

yet, when junhui was in the shower for so long that the hot water ran out, and he was just about to hit his peak, he thought about minghao. 

that just sent him over the edge.

the woman continued laughing as she handed jun his luggage,

“what a small world we live in hm? where are you flying to?”

jun was about to answer when a little girl came running towards the old woman,

“grandma!! our flight is boarding!!”  
“oh is it? let’s go then”

she turned to jun, smiling kindly,

“take care of yourself dear, have a safe flight”

jun barely muttered out a “you too thank you” before the little girl pulled her grandma away and they ran in the opposite direction.

as jun waited in line at a coffee shop near his gate, he thought about the chances of seeing that woman again. shenzhen was a massive city, and even if the airport brought in thousands of people every day, he figures the chances were slim to none. 

he wondered what his chances of seeing minghao again were. certainly zero, considering where he was going.

to past the time before his flight started boarding, he listened to his favorite songs and muttered along to them. he wished there was a private area he could practice his singing in, but his usual sanctuary of the bathroom was anything less than private. 

he even started to do the choreography along to them, but he noticed a few people looking at him, so he stopped, embarrassed. 

finally, after what seemed like an eternity, jun heard the announcement,

“flight 610 to ___ will begin boarding now”

the intercom cut out, but he recognized the flight number, so he sprung up from his seat and pulled out his boarding pass, hurriedly walking towards the line that was already forming.

jun handed his pass to the flight attendant, who scanned it, and handed it back to him with a curious expression,

“you’re flying alone?”  
“yes”  
“that’s brave of you. if you need anything, let one of us know okay? we’re happy to help. enjoy your flight”

she smiled at him. jun just nodded; he wanted to get on the plane as fast as he could.

he was enthusiastically greeted by more flight attendants, but jun raced to the back of the plane, trying to find his seat.

when he did, he set his backpack down and heaved his luggage to the overhead compartments. a man walked by, watching him

“wow, you’re strong, kid!”

he chuckled, sitting down at a seat near jun. 

his luggage wasn’t even that heavy anyway. but he had to admit that he had gained a lot of muscle in the past year, but with the crazy direction his life was taking, there wasn’t room for anything less. he had to be fit; he was hoping it would give him an advantage over the others.

the plane was huge, and jun suspected it was a full flight, so he had a lot of time to spare before take off.

thus, he stared out the window and watched the workers on the ground, driving in their little cars loaded with luggage. 

as it always did, his mind wandered.

he thought about yesterday, and the conversation him and his mom had,

“are you SURE you even want to go junhui??”

his mom looked at him, hands stopped mid-fold of a pair of jeans. jun looked up from packing his luggage and frowned,

“of course mom, they already paid for my ticket, i can’t turn them down now”  
“this is a big decision... and you’re still so young...”

she walked over and cupped his face in her hands, pouting. he squirmed out from her,

“but i really want to do this mom, it’s my dream. i’ll have a better chance than here anyway, i’ve had rotten luck with casting calls and auditions...”  
“i’m proud of you baby, i really am... but i am your mom, i get worried you know...”

he suddenly felt bad for having rejected her coddling, so he gave her a hug,

“i know mom. i’m probably going to be real homesick too, i’ll call often”  
“you better. make it big out there okay junhui? i can’t wait to brag to my friends that i have a famous son”

she laughed, assuring him she was kidding, but jun still hated when she acted like that. he loved his mom, but the pressure she put on him, whether intentional or not, made him feel like shit. it was the a major source of his anxieties and insecurities.

he was just glad his dad was mostly out of his life. ever since his parents divorce, jun’s felt much happier and more at ease. he knew he was supposed to feel like, conflicted over it, but he knew his parents had been fighting nonstop for years. his mom deserved better than him, and when she sat him and his brother down and told them that they were going to separate, and they she was taking custody of both of them and moving across the city, he knew it was for the best.

yang yang, his little brother, took it harder than jun, because he didn’t see their dad in the same light that jun saw him. he was sad that they couldn’t see him often, and they they were moving and leaving all of their friends behind, but he eventually got used to it. after all, their mom was able to rent them a three bedroom apartment in a better part of the city, so yang yang was happy at the prospect of him having his own room. jun enjoyed that as well; he finally got the privacy he had been yearning for for years.

his life was better in this new apartment anyway. his new school was way better, he met people who actually liked him for who he was and had real friends, his mom was much happier and didn’t work as long of hours, and jun grew a lot mentally and emotionally.

he grew closer to his mom as well, and began confiding in her his struggles and his passions for singing and acting that he had been keeping secret for long. she wasn’t too supportive of it at first, but after seeing how dedicated and truly talented jun was, she accepted his dreams.

but there was one secret that he continued to keep from not just her, but everyone in his life. his sexuality. 

china wasn’t the most progressive country in the world, and he knew he couldn’t come out to just anyone. even if he thought that they might not react badly, he was too afraid of the risk. so that stayed with him. he didn’t know how long it would be a secret, but he hoped that one day, he could tell his family and feel safe.

as jun and his mom were finishing packing, yang yang ran into his room,

“jun, take him with you!!”

he shoved a large frog plushie at jun. it was old; some of the threads around the frog’s mouth were coming loose, and yang yang had spilt juice on him, so he had a stain on his stomach.

jun hadn’t seen that plushie in a very long time. he was glad he hadn’t: it was the same exact plushie that minghao had picked up all those years ago and said he owned as a kid. he would’ve burned the thing if yang yang hadn’t gotten so attached to it.

“are you sure, yang yang? you love qīngwā”  
“i’m sure!! i’m giving it to you so you’ll remember me. you won’t forget about your brother, right jun?”

jun reluctantly took the plushie. his brother had named it qīngwā, which simply meant frog. uncreative, but yang yang was 7. it was endearing.

but what yang yang said had given jun a weird deja vu moment. the line about not forgetting him... but that was weird. he was sure that his parents had bought qīngwā for yang yang long ago, so it wasn’t like this same scenario had happened before. maybe some friend had told him this about something else. jun would never know.

“of course i won’t, how could i forget about you? you’re my favorite brother”  
“really??”

yang yang hugged jun and ran out of the room as jun chuckled; he obviously didn’t get jun’s joke.

as he stuffed qīngwā into his luggage and zipped it up, he heard yang yang cry out,

“but you only have one brother!!”

-

the plane had filled up, and finally, they took off. jun held his breath like he always did on planes as they left the earth. it was a weird ritual he had done for the longest time, and even if it served no real purpose, it gave him some needed comfort.

as shenzhen became nothing but a few skyscrapers with car-shaped specks slugging across the traffic-ridden highways, the night sky soon swallowed the city, its neon lights, and all that junhui had ever known. but he was too tired to feel sad, or anxious, as his eyes grew heavier and heavier. 

as he drifted away, he heard a deep voice announce over the intercom,

“ladies and gentlemen, we are now in the air. please stay in your seats until the fasten-seatbelt light is off. the current flight time to seoul, south korea is estimated to be 8 hours and 15 minutes. we’ll be turning off the cabin lights in 10 minutes. have a good night”

jun felt like electricity was running through his veins. this was really it...

as he fell into a deep sleep, all he could think about was the endless possibilities that a new city would provide him. he hoped it’d treat him well. 

-

“good morning everyone, the local time in seoul is 8:07 AM. the temperature is a beautiful 19 degrees celsius, and there’s not a cloud in the sky. please stay seated until the fasten-seatbelt light is off for your own safety. thank you for flying with us, we hope to serve you again”

jun was wide awake; he had fallen asleep for about 4 hours, then felt too excited to sleep. he put on headphones and listened to music to calm him down, attempting to read the “learn korean quick” book he brought with him, but he couldn’t concentrate, he just ended up reading the same paragraph over and over again. 

he drifted in and out of sleep for the rest of the plane trip, finally staying fully awake when he peeked out of the window, only to be blinded by blasting rays of sunlight. he hastily shut the window, but upon noticing the person next to him was fast asleep, he pried it open an inch, than another, then some more,

like shenzhen, seoul seemed to be surrounded by endless city. no softly rolling pastures or endless suburbs. just grids upon grids upon even more grids. jun felt comforted by these similarities. 

the plane descended, and now jun could see the cars zipping across the wide highways. jun imagined himself falling to the earth, no plane to sit comfortably in, just free falling through the clouds and watching as everything around him became life-sized and real. maybe he just really wanted to skydive.

“touchdown...”

jun thought as the plane hit the earth. as they slowed across the runway, it hit jun that he was here. like, physically here. he often felt like he didn’t deserve to be flown out here, but now that he was actually here, he wanted nothing more to explore the city, to explore the place where his dreams would be made.

jun walked down the terminal with the other passengers, glancing at the posters with smiling faces and shots of the city with the caption “welcome to seoul” or “incheon airport: rated the best airport for 8 years and counting”.

they reached a sign that told them (luckily, in korean, english, and chinese) the greeting area was to the left, and the exit to the buses and taxis were to the right. jun took a left. 

there were swarms of people, all glancing at the passenger’s faces, trying to pick out their relatives or friends. junhui did the same until he heard a very familiar voice from ahead call his name,

“JUNHUI!!!”

sure enough, yanan had made his way to the front of the crowd and was frantically waving at jun. he ran towards him, not being able to stop the massive grin that seemed to take up his entire face.

they immediately embraced each other, yanan breaking away with an even bigger grin plastered on his face, his eyes sparkling,

“dude! i can’t believe we’re here!!”  
“i know!! oh my god this is crazy huh?”  
“how was your flight? it was nonstop wasn’t it?”  
“yeah, i was asleep for most of it so it wasn’t that bad”  
“was getting through customs okay?”  
“they were really nice, but it was pretty crowded so that’s why i’m a little late. did you have to wait long??”  
“no!! not at all, we got here like 45 minutes ago, so the others are at the video game center. did you know there’s a mall in here?? and a golf course?? AND AN ICE SKATING RINK???”

they couldn’t stop talking; it truly was old friends reuniting again, but despite the time the two had spent apart, they talked like no time had passed. 

the last time jun had seen yanan was almost 2 years ago, but he was still the same bright, bubbly kid as ever. granted, the two had grown substantially; yanan was well passed 6 feet and jun wasn’t far behind.

when he heard that yanan had also passed the audition, he was even more sure that he wanted to go to korea. initially, he was so afraid of being alone in a foreign country that he wanted to turn down the invitation, but knowing that him and yanan would be together gave him the security of having someone he knew with him that he needed. 

they continued to chat and catch up on each other’s lives since they had last seen each other as they went to collect jun’s bigger luggage from the pickup area,

“did you already graduate high school?”

yanan asked as he wheeled jun’s luggage for him,

“yeah, i dropped out about 7 months ago and finished up online. it’s so cool that you can do that, it gave me more time to practice anyway”  
“same here. but practicing before you’re even a trainee? that’s the hardworking junhui i know!”

yanan laughed, but jun felt his anxieties over being called hardworking come up again; he hated it, but he couldn’t deny that the pressure and stress he felt from it still lingered years later.

yanan explained that there were 5 other chinese applicants who had made it past the audition, so they would be meeting up with them and their manager then heading back to what he called the “battleground” they had all arrived a couple days before jun; he was the last to accept the invitation, so the company had to put him on the next available flight.

“a manager?”

jun asked. he thought only actual idols got those; not kids who weren’t even trainees yet.

“he’s not actually our manager, we just call him that. he speaks chinese, so he helps us with language stuff and is kinda like our chaperone”

eventually they arrived at the biggest arcade jun had ever seen. he was tempted to just explore around and play as many games as he could, but they quickly met up with the other applicants.

as jun was about to greet them, he caught wind of their conversation, which was entirely in korean. he turned to yanan and whispered,

“uh, do we have to speak korean...?”  
“no, but they encourage you to. have you been practicing?”

admittedly, jun hadn’t been keeping up with his korean studies. his mom enrolled him in a class, and he did okay, but it was only for a semester, so he barely studied after the class ended. he could hold a simple conversation and fluently read hangul, but that was about as far as he got.

“to be honest, not as much as i should be...”  
“same here. it’s okay, we’ll learn together”

yanan smiled at jun, the same one from years and years ago. it reassured him greatly; he couldn’t help but return it.

the other applicants seemed nice; there was even one from the same province as jun and yanan. their manager greeted jun kindly before shepherding the kids out of the arcade area. they had two large black vans that that traveled in, so they split up, yanan and jun sticking together.

after loading jun’s luggage into the truck, yanan and jun continued chatting away in the backseat as the van pulled out of the airport and slugged its way out of the traffic.

after they finally made it out of the airport and were headed into the actual city, yanan was pulled into a conversation by a couple of the other kids. jun was happy for the diversion; he wanted to marvel at the city.

he was a city boy at heart, having lived in shenzhen for all his life, but he had only been out of china once when he was 12. thus, seoul intrigued him greatly.

large billboards advertised the latest skincare line from a brand jun had heard his mom talk about, girls with perfectly poreless skin smiled and held up containers of cleansers, moisturizers, and everything in between.

the buildings weren’t as tall as shenzhen, but the plentiful amount of small restaurants and local businesses gave the city an inviting, warm feel. even at 9:30 am the streets were bustling. people rode by on electric scooters, women clung to the backs of men who expertly navigated the busy streets. honks of nearby cars comforted jun, the revving of engines as natural as a bird chirping in the early hours of the morning.

the wide highways narrowed into smaller, two lane streets. jun could see people walking now, college students with masks and headphones on speed walking. men in sharp suits walked with a purpose and disappeared into large glass buildings. jun could imagine them typing away at their computers in their cubicles, doing their perfectly respectable job and earning a decent income. jun wondered if he’d ever have to be like them.

as he watched people go about their daily lives, he began to think about the unique circumstances that led him here.

after moving out of his childhood apartment, he had more time and privacy to practice his passions: singing and acting. he had been cultivating them before then, but fell into a slump, so he took a long break, and only started again when he had picked himself up after being broken hearted by minghao. 

he finally mustered the courage to tell his mom that he wanted to pursue them as a career. once she came to terms with it, they looked for opportunities anywhere they could. casting calls, auditions, but they never worked out. no matter how much jun thought he had improved, and how long he would practiced, each and every company or agency would turn him down. it discouraged him, but at the same time, it motivated him to work even harder and prove to them that he had potential and talent. he wanted to make them regret not accepting him.

it was around this time last year when jun discovered the korean entrainment world. a lot of his friends enjoyed kpop, and even if jun couldn’t understand most of what they were saying, he enjoyed the songs and found himself humming along to their infectious beats.

he quickly realized that the entertainment scene in korea was large, and teeming with opportunity. he learnt about the process of auditioning for a company and being a trainee under them, and getting the possibility to debut, or put out a work into the industry and hoped it’d do well. the more jun found out, the more interested he was.

he realized that this was the perfect chance for him. it seemed that most companies accepted applications for singers, actors, rappers, and dancers. and they didn’t have to be korean either; they often accepted foreign applicants as well.

and coincidentally, a company called SC entertainment would be holding an audition right in shenzhen in one month.

jun looked up a bit about SC entertainment and found out it was run by a man named choi seungcheol, and it was one of the top entertainment companies in korea. 

the company only took applications for singers, rappers, and dancers; no actors. although a bit disappointed, jun had been practicing his singing more anyway, so he figured if he made it big enough through his singing, he could eventually land some acting roles. 

with that in mind, jun filled out an application online, printed it, and began practicing his piece for the audition.

he did it in secret, however. he was too afraid to tell his mom; he decided that if he did pass, she might be mad at first, but ultimately proud that he managed to pass the audition. but if he didn’t, he would just forget about it and wouldn’t ever tell her; simple as that. he was pretty sure they wouldn’t accept him anyway; most of the kids who would be auditioning had probably trained for longer than jun. 

he still remembered the utter shock when he did. out of the 270 kids there, only 5, including jun, passed. those 5 were offered an all-expenses-paid trip to korea to go through another audition that would determine if the company would offer them a trainee contract. 

and now, about 10 months later, junhui was here. sometimes, like now, it didn’t really seem real, but he tried to take it one day at a time in order to not get overwhelmed. 

jun was brought back to the present upon spotting a few street food vendors selling everything from tteokbokki to hotteok. his mouth watered at the sight of them; he hadn’t eaten anything since the mediocre plane food, and he was getting hungry, but he was afraid to ask if they would stop for food.

luckily another kid did, and their manager said they had time to stop at a convenience store to pick up a quick breakfast. 

like shenzhen, the korean convenience store was basically a grocery store, and offered a wide variety of pre-packaged meals and even a place where you could heat up your ramen. jun chose one he often ate back at home, happy to have a little piece of shenzhen with him even when he thousands of miles away. 

their manager said it was only another 15 minutes to the company building, where they and the other applicants would go through a sort of orientation and be given their temporary dorms. jun was suddenly nervous, he hadn’t thought of the other applicants. he assumed they would all be korean, or maybe japanese, since all of the chinese applicants were here... he hoped they’d be nice. 

the sc company building was a tall, expensive looking building. it was in the middle of a fairly quiet street, so only a couple of pedestrians walked by. the vans pulled into the parking lot next to the building, kids getting out excitedly. their manager said that the drivers would take jun’s luggage up to his dorm for him; they had already been picked out. 

they got into an elevator that would take them to the lobby of the building. as everyone chatted excitedly, jun went through the choreography in this head.

finally, they stepped out. the lobby was crowded with kids; there were a lot more than jun expected, he estimated about 30-40 kids. they were huddled in small groups, and the air was filled with the laughter and loud buzz of teenagers talking.

their manager turned to them,

“i need to go meet up with the other staff. let me give you your tags, everyone needs to wear them. they’ll make an announcement when orientation starts, so just follow along”

he pulled out a stack of tags from his coat pocket and called out names, giving them to each kid. 

“wen junhui?”

jun raised his hand, and the manager tossed him his tag. his name was printed in english, korean, and chinese, and he was number 17. 

“cool, i’m number 5”

yanan peeked over at jun’s tag, smiling. 

their manager finished handing out tags and bid them farewell. immediately, some of the kids raced off in small groups, and others went to talk to the other trainees.

eventually, just yanan and jun were left. yanan turned to jun, biting his lip anxiously,

“hey jun, i know you probably don’t wanna be left alone, but i promised some others that i would meet them before orientation. we’ll be by the restrooms okay? it’s just to the left so you’ll see them, you’re welcome to join if you want!!”

jun didn’t really mind being left alone actually; he wanted to scope out the competition.

“that’s okay man, i’ll go over when orientation starts. i’ll be fine”  
“you sure?”  
“yeah, go ahead, i wanna get a look at the other applicants”

yanan nodded, giving a quick smile before racing off into the crowd.

junhui pinned his tag to his shirt and walked around. the applicants looked like any other teenagers, and there were a fair amount of girls too, but one group of guys towards the back caught jun’s eye.

he walked closer so he could make out their name tags, but leaned against the wall and tried not to make it obvious he was watching them.

the first name tag he sees is “lee chan”, attached to a very young looking boy. he was laughing loudly; jun could hear his laugh from where he was standing. he couldn’t really understand what he was saying, but the boy suddenly broke out into dance, dancing what looked to be michael jackson’s dance for “beat it”. jun could tell the boy was confident, but for a good reason; his dance was amazing. 

junhui realized he’d have some steep competition.

suddnely another boy joined chan, he looked closer to jun’s age, his name “kwon soonyoung”. he was all smiles and laughs, his eyes turning up like hands on a clock as he playfully jumped around, and just from his movements and quick transitions, jun could tell the boy was a good dancer. again, another confident boy.

a small boy was silently laughing, holding his stomach as he watched soonyoung act like a bit of a fool. jun could make out the name “lee jihoon”.

two boys chatted a little outside of the group. one looked american; maybe he was mixed. his name was “chwe hansol”, and the other boy, who looked fully korean, had an american name, “joshua hong”, which confused jun even more.

he watched the 5 boys for a while before moving on to some of the other applicants.

jun was just about to go find yanan when something, or rather, someone, caught his eye.

at first, he thought his eyes were just playing tricks on him. sometimes he saw minghao in kids on the street, or on the sidewalk near his old middle school. but it was just his stupid mind playing tricks on him. making jun long for him even when he was completely over minghao.

but... this time, it looked more real. the boy was taller than minghao, but he had the same big, beautiful eyes and elf-like ears. the same button nose and perfectly shaped pink lips...expensive looking clothes...

jun froze. he felt his body stiffen, his heart beating and beating and beating out of his chest until it pounded into his ears. he trembled, fingers shaking. 

“no... no no no no it is not him it isn’t him how could it be him?? he lives in china!! he moved back to liaoning!! of course he did so stupid junhui it isn’t him, this boy just looks a lot like minghao”

yet, jun felt like he’d throw up as the boy walked closer, not looking in his direction. 

but he suddenly whipped his head around. to stare right at jun. and junhui could see his tag. and in three different languages, 

“xu minghao (seo myungho)”  
“서명호”  
“徐明浩”

they made eye contact for less than a millisecond before jun raced out, he didn’t even know where he was running as the other applicants looked at him in confusion, he just wanted to run back to shenzhen, to run far far away and never ever look back.

he could see yanan up ahead, and next to him the doors to the bathroom. as he stumbled in, he heard yanan’s voice,

“jun?? jun, are you okay? you look really pale!!”

but junhui barely made it to the toilet in time before he vomited his ramen into the bowl, he couldn’t stop shaking.

breathing heavily, he held his head in his arms and he cried. he was so overwhelmed by surprise and emotion, all he wanted to do was crawl into his bed back at home and sleep, to wake up to his mom making his favorite breakfast and yanan begging him to watch cartoons with him.

as junhui’s heart continued to beat like a drum in his ears, he realized one thing.

he was completely, utterly, undoubtedly, 100%, still in love with xu minghao.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this “era” will have 3 chapters. next chapter will finally get steamy, promise, then the final chapter will be in minghao’s pov. i then plan to have a minimum of 2 more chapters. 
> 
> jun’s experience does not at all represent what the actual process of becoming a trainee/idol in korea is, i took many liberties. also, in this universe, jun, minghao, and 5 seventeen members that are revealed in this chapter are the same age: 16/17 (with chan being about 15). the rest are around the same age they are as of the time i’m writing this; they’ll all be incorporated into the story. 
> 
> i didn’t plan for this era to be so long, but i really wanted to flesh out jun’s character. i know there hasn't been much actual junhao romance, but it’ll get there, i promise. this is supposed to be very drawn out anyway. so i hope you stick with it. i’ll try to update it as much as i can, but i get struck with inspiration and motivation randomly, and i’m very picky with my writing, so i’m sorry if chapters are sporadic. 
> 
> thank you if you’re actually reading this 🥺


	4. yr 3- 2014 (pt 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> then he thought about them falling in love. naturally, and for real. about them becoming trainees together, stealing kisses in between long practice sessions and “casually” touching each other as they worked on moves, cuddling in bed together after a long day. making out in the darkness of their dorm, trying not to wake the others up. maybe even going further than that.
> 
> doing normal couple things. going on dates to the movies, or a cute little coffee shop. maybe even an art gallery; jun could use his cheesy pickup lines that he adored, there were plenty of art ones he could use. his favorite was “i can’t draw hands, can you hold mine for reference?”
> 
> debuting together. becoming famous together, maybe even one day making their relationship public. jun wouldn’t care what anyone else had to say; he hoped that by the time that happened, no one would care that they were two men in love.

“jun... i’m not really sure what’s up, but orientation is about to start, and i don’t think we should be late for that...”

yanan knocked on junhui’s stall, jun could see his feet standing outside the door. 

he was already embarrassed enough, having sprinted through the lobby into the bathroom, the others probably thought he really had to take a shit or something. but sitting in the bathroom of the lobby of one of the top korean entertainment companies in a foreign country where he barely spoke the language and encountering the person who broke his heart was a new low for jun. 

he wanted nothing more than to disappear, but he had to get through this. he wasn’t going to lose this possibly once-in-a-lifetime chance of achieving his dream all because of a stupid boy who shouldn’t even be making him react like this. it was completely possible that minghao didn’t even remember junhui, he didn’t get to see his reaction to him before he sprinted to the bathroom.

junhui took a deep breath before opening the stall door to find yanan with wide eyes, chewing furiously on his lip. he seemed to not know what to say, so jun assured him he was okay,

“sorry about that man, i couldn’t hold down that ramen, i suddenly really got the urge to throw up”  
“they have a nurse’s office you know, i could tell one of the staff you aren’t feeling well”

jun was horrified at drawing even more attention to himself by having to go the nurse even before orientation, so he shook his head,

“no no, i feel a lot better now, it’s okay. let’s just go to orientation, you’re right, we shouldn’t be late”

he didn’t know if yanan had heard him crying, but he was glad he didn’t ask about it, just nodded and tentatively patted jun on the back as they walked out of the bathroom.

jun tried to not look at anyone in fear of seeing minghao again, but luckily, everyone was still huddled up in groups, so no one paid attention to jun. he stuck to yanan as he led him to his group of friends stood near the bathroom. they seemed nice too; no one looked at jun weirdly or asked him why he had run into the bathroom. junhui felt the knot in his stomach loosen a bit; if they had, jun would’ve probably ended up crying again. 

and he couldn’t let anyone here see him cry. 

suddenly, the whole lobby went quiet. all of the chatter and laughter ceased in a matter of seconds. as jun looked around to find the source of this sudden silence, yanan whispered,

“the ceo just walked in, look”

he pointed to a door that had opened up ahead, through which a couple of adults walked in. 

one of them was dressed in a sharp black suit and glasses, his pitch black hair perfectly styled so that it grazed his glasses and eyes ever so slightly. he gave off an aura of professionalism, but through his kind eyes and soft features, jun felt like he was a genuine and honest man. 

closely following him was a man of equal stature, but his hair was longer, and a striking light blonde; it sort of made him look like an angel. he too wore glasses, but his suit was a plaid, light grey. his gave off a more no-nonsense aura, which made jun a bit fearful.

but there was no denying that both of them were extremely handsome; and rather young looking. if either of them was the ceo, jun would be in trouble. he’d spend more time drooling over them than actually practicing.

the man with dark hair stepped on a small platform that was conveniently placed for him and cleared his throat, adjusting the mic pinned to his suit,

“welcome, future trainees! i’m delighted to see so many of your promising faces this early in the morning. i assume that most of you know this, but i am the ceo, choi seungcheol.”

a couple of whispers were exchanged, jun joining in as he whispered to yanan,

“the ceo will lead the orientation?”  
“yeah, he’s known for being one of the most involved ceos. he personally chooses the trainees, and he has a background in rapping and dancing, so he even helps out in practices and stuff” 

jun liked that; a ceo who was more down to earth and personable. maybe that was one of the reasons sc entertainment was one of the top.

the ceo spoke again as the whispers died down,

“so, you all have your pins with your names, correct? they should have a number too. these correspond to your dorm placements: they are random. 4 people per dorm room, so when we show off the dorms at the end of the tour, you’ll all get a chance to find who your dorm mates are”

people immediately began checking each other’s tags, jun and yanan looking at each other in disappointment; jun was 17, and yanan was 5. he hoped he had at least one other chinese kid in his dorm.

“my assistant, yoon jeonghan, and i will lead the tour”

he gestured at the blonde man next to him, who held up a hand and smiled cooly.

“since there are a lot of you, numbers 1-20 will be with mr. yoon and 21-40 will be with me. please line up in front of us accordingly”

everyone scrambled to line up, jun happy that at least yanan and him would be in the same orientation group.

right in front of him and yanan were the group of boys that jun had watched earlier; lee chan and friends. they were still happily chatting away.

up ahead, jun couldn’t help but notice the back of the head of a boy with short, light brown hair. even if he knew it was minghao, and it hurt to look at him, he couldn’t help but stare; he had not gotten to in years.

their orientation began and it was about as standard as tours got. mr. yoon showed them around the building and talked about the company policies, all of the famous artists who traineed under them, and what the kids would have to go through for their second audition,

“we pride ourselves on producing some of the best idols and artists in the country. as such, your second audition will be much less forgiving as your first one. as most of you should know if you read the emails we’ve been sending out, you will stay at your assigned dorms for 3 weeks, in which you will use that time to prepare for the audition. everyone will receive lessons in singing or rapping and dancing, as well as media etiquette and other essential skills, since for this audition, we require applicants to show proficiency in either singing or rapping and dancing.”

jun knew this; he was nervous at first at the idea of having to learn how to dance as well, but if it meant he would earn the chance of making it big, he’d do anything. for months, jun had gone to dance classes and worked out as often as he could. his instructor insisted he was a natural, and jun had to agree; dancing came as naturally to him as singing and acting. he understood how freeing it was, how satisfying to lose yourself in the choreography and the movements of your body was. 

his instructor picked out a song that he choreographed a short dance routine to for junhui to learn, which he’d been diligently doing so for months. he still struggled on some of the hard parts, and he hadn’t mastered singing at the same time, but he hoped this at least put him at a bit of an advantage over the others; he’d use these 3 weeks to master the choreography and singing at the same time.

“speaking of dorms, they’re up ahead. go find your dorm mates based on your numbers, then come see me for the key, you’ll each get one”

jun said a sad goodbye to yanan as he walked off to find his dorm mates.

suddnely, a boy with braces and cute upturned eyes appeared in front of junhui, smiling,

“you’re 17?? i’m 18!!”

it was soonyoung, the boy jun saw dancing earlier. he hadn’t noticed the braces.

he nodded and smiled at the boy; although a bit rambunctious, jun thought soonyoung could provide some fun hijinks in their dorm.

“jihoon!! you’re 20, aren’t you?”

soonyoung was looking to his right, jun doing the same and seeing the small boy who was with soonyoung tentatively walk up to them, frowning,

“unfortunately...i’m not going to be able to sleep these next few weeks...”

soonyoung laughed and threw his arm around jihoon who nodded his head at jun. he’d provide the stability and calmness in their dorms, jun thought. a good balance. 

“i wonder who 19 is??”

soonyoung wondered out loud. they looked around, but it seems everyone had already found their dorm mates. 

but of course, one boy stood alone. 

the boy with soft brown hair and long pretty hands made their way over to them, looking only at soonyoung and jihoon,

“oh, i’m 19. looks like we’re dorm mates”

minghao spoke perfect korean; he barely had an accent. jun forced himself to not stare, not when minghao was so close.

thankfully, minghao left to go get their keys. soonyoung looked at junhui’s name tag,

“so you’re jun... can we just call you jun? are you from china?”  
“yes...”

jun’s voice came out softer than he wanted it to, but he still wasn’t confident in his korean. he realized how much he’d struggle communicating with them... if only he had someone chinese to help him...

it hit him that minghao was chinese. but asking him for help was so ridiculous that it was almost laughable. 

suddnely, jun realized something. minghao was definitely chinese, but he wasn’t with the other chinese applicants when they went to pick up jun from the airport. didn’t yanan say all of the chinese applicants were there? why wasn’t minghao there?

so, after they had picked out their beds (soonyoung immediately claimed the top bunk, and jihoon reluctantly climbed into the bed below him, leaving minghao and jun with the other bunk. still not looking at jun, minghao just climbed to the top and started setting out his belongings), jun asked yanan his question,

“minghao? oh, he’s been in korea for like a year. he apparently goes to a really elite performing arts school nearby, i guess his parents are rich. since he’s basically fluent in korean, we kinda don’t consider him a chinese applicant...”

the two took their seats at the table; everyone was released to the dining hall where they had access to a buffet full of delicious-looking food, including some chinese food that jun loaded his plate full of.

so minghao had moved to korea? figures, he wanted to go into dancing; the opportunities were greater in korea after all. he wondered how supportive his parents were, since jun knew that rich parents; especially one with an only son, were very restrictive with what career path their child chose. they usually had the option of being a doctor, lawyer, or to take up the family business: that’s it.

but junhui knew minghao was really great at dancing. he had seen him dance a few times when they were friends, and his b-boying was no joke. he had talent, it’d be a waste if he didn’t utilize it. 

so in a way, it wasn’t that surprising that minghao was here. maybe his parents had even paid his way in. 

but it just had to be when jun was here too. all he wanted was to work hard to pass the audition and begin his trainee life, but as they always did, his plans complicated. now, he’d have a major distraction; something he couldn’t afford.

as he stuffed rice into his mouth, he thought about the way yanan talked about minghao. they had all gone to the same middle school after all; surely yanan remembered minghao? jun had told him all the bad stuff minghao had done after all, so he asked him,

“yanan, don’t you remember minghao?”  
“from when?”  
“middle school? don’t you remember how he attended our school for like a week before transferring back out? he was my friend, but talked shit behind my back?”

yanan frowned, clearly not remembering at all. but suddenly, his eyes lit up. quickly, he frowned again,

“oh! that minghao... damn dude i barely remember him, it happened so long ago and we barely got to know him... but...”

he zeroed in on minghao who was sitting with a group of trainees jun didn’t know,

“but, i always felt a bad vibe from him. now i know why, i’ll make sure to steer clear of him”  
“can we sit with you guys??”

jun recognized soonyoung’s voice; he was accompanied by jihoon and his other friends; chan, joshua, and hansol. 

yanan looked at jun, who nodded, quickly telling him that soonyoung and jihoon were his dorm mates before smiling at soonyoung,

“yes, of course”

they sat down and yanan introduced himself, soonyoung grinning widely,

“oh, so you’re both chinese!! cool, my chinese isn’t very good though...”  
“that’s okay, we can just speak korean”

jun envied yanan’s natural response, he was clearly more advanced than jun. 

with yanan occasionally translating for jun, the 7 had a casual conversation. jun learned that soonyoung likes to sing, but mainly specialized in dancing, and jihoon was basically a triple threat; he had learned to produce music, he could sing, and he could dance. 

chan came from parents who were both dancers, which explained his natural dancing abilities. hansol was mixed, like jun thought, but he was planning to train to be a rapper, and joshua was from america, and sang as well as played the guitar. 

the 5 had caught his eye for a reason, jun thought. they were all very nice, fun, and clearly talented. he hoped that they would all make it pass the audition, even if they proved to be tough competition.

they would have their first lesson later that afternoon, but they had a couple hours of free time. soonyoung and the others were going to an arcade nearby their building, and yanan was going to hang out with a couple of the other chinese kids. they both invited jun to join, but he declined; he really just wanted to take a nap in the dorm.

luckily, it was empty, so jun took a shower, changed into comfier clothes, and laid in bed. he was tired, but he couldn’t really fall asleep; his mind kept racing with thoughts.

he was about to grab his korean book, hoping that would put him to sleep, when the door opened. he jolted back into bed, hoping it was just soonyoung or jihoon, but of course, it wasn’t.

minghao stood in the doorway, but jun couldn’t really see him since the lights were off. 

minghao flicked the lights on and started right at jun; the first time today he had done so.

his face had matured a bit, but he was still the same minghao that jun once loved. the only major difference was his height and his hair; it was a pretty light brown that was styled so that part of it swooped down and brushed his eyebrows. 

he wore well-fitted jeans and a flannel shirt worn like a jacket over a plain shirt. it was rolled up, so jun could see his arms which were quite muscular. he couldn’t help but admire his slightly skinny but lean figure.

despite his hatred of minghao, jun’s heart couldn’t help but beat when he stared at him. he may be an asshole, but he sure was pretty...

minghao walked over to him, cocking his head slightly and sucking in his cheeks,

“didn’t expect to see you here”

jun said nothing; he didn’t particularly want to talk to minghao right now. 

“silent as usual. well, we’re dorm mates and nothing more okay? don’t try any gay shit around me. i have a girlfriend”

this angered jun enough to respond,

“i’m appalled that you even think you’re pretty enough for me to flirt with. i’m just here to become a trainee and nothing more. i’m not trying to make friends, especially with you”  
“well, you did once. i’m gonna shower, don’t open the door”

minghao frowned before grabbing clothes from his bag and slamming the door to the bathroom shut. what an asshat.

junhui wasn’t normally that snarky, but he was more confident in chinese, and minghao didn’t scare him as much as he thought he would.

of course minghao had a girlfriend. the boy was as straight as the stick stuck up his ass, but jun couldn’t help but feel his heart crack a bit at the news. whatever. minghao clearly wanted nothing to do with him, and jun should feel the same.

yet, he couldn’t help but dream about his soft lips and long fingers. even if he couldn’t have him, jun was still head over heels for the boy. 

what a nightmare.

as minghao left the bathroom and was walking out of the door, he turned to jun again,

“the competition is tough here. i hope you practiced your singing”

he said it in korean, so jun wasn’t sure if what he heard was right, but he was gone before jun could retaliate. 

his comment wasn’t necessarily nice, but the fact that he remember that jun sang made him think about their time together when they were younger, and what minghao remembered from it. he wondered how someone could act so nice, so sweet, so interested in what jun had to say then go behind his back and blatantly betray him and his sexuality. 

he wondered who the real xu minghao was. maybe he was hurting the same way jun was.

-

the days went on a similar fashion. wake up at 8:30 am, have breakfast, go to your first lesson, eat lunch, break, then have your other lessons until dinner at about 6:30. it was usually free time after that. sometimes they’d call for a meeting to discuss more procedures, but it didn’t happen often. 

on the third day, jun woke up earlier than usual. the other boys were still asleep, so jun decided to go get some early morning practice in before breakfast. as he walked downstairs, he heard what sounded like slamming against something hard, like a desk. as he got closer to the source, he heard soft moans coming from a cracked room.

his curiosity getting the better of him, junhui peeked in.

the ceo, mr. choi, and his assistant, mr. yoon, were heavily making out. mr. choi had the other slammed up against the wall, his knee pressing up against mr. yoon’s crotch which produced the soft moans junhui had heard earlier. 

jun was frozen in shock. he shouldn’t be seeing this,   
but... he couldn’t deny the hotness of the sight.

he managed to sneak away, but he was sure the two were too engrossed to even have noticed jun looking at them. as he was about to turn a corner, he heard the door slam shut. probably for the best.

as junhui took care of the... situation between his legs in the bathroom, and was washing his hands, he thought about what he had just seen. 

he wondered if they were actually together, or if it was a secret affair. he figured it was the latter, since he couldn’t imagine the ceo of a korean entertainment company being with his male assistant would go over well with most people. 

he was dying to tell what he saw to the others, so he didn’t get much practicing done. junhui realized he’d probably never see the ceo and his assistant in the same way ever again, but in a good way. at least he knew this company wasn’t homophobic. 

that morning at breakfast, jun was all giggles. he could barely pull it together to tell the others what was up,

“so... i woke up early this morning, so i went down to the practice rooms to pass the time, but on my way there...”

he broke out into a fit of giggles again, but soonyoung urged him to go on,

“what?? what happened?”  
“i passed by a room... i think it was... i don’t know the word in korean... and in there was mr. choi and mr. yoon, and they were making out!”

he said that a little louder than intended, but luckily no one else seemed to hear him. everyone looked shocked, but soonyoung began giggling,

“seriously?? and they had the door open?”  
“well, only a little, but i could see in”  
“did they see you?”

asked jihoon, who was blushing a bit. 

“no, i got away before they finally closed the door”

there was a moment of silence before yanan spoke up,

“i kinda thought they had a thing anyway, they always look at each other in a certain way”  
“i think that’s cute, i hope they date if that aren’t already”

chan piped up, and to jun’s surprise, everyone nodded. no one seemed to care that they were both men, no one said gross, or that it was gay in a negative way. no laughs because of it, nothing.

junhui couldn’t believe it. for once, he didn’t have to stay silent as the people around him were blatantly homophobic. as they made jun feel stupid, small, like he shouldn’t like boys as much as he did. like he should be having girlfriends and dreaming about his perfect life with a wife and two kids, working a perfectly normal office job.

for the first time since he arrived in korea, jun felt at home. 

-

the rest of the week went by mostly uneventfully, at least compared to the make out incident. the lessons jun had were fun; he enjoyed learning more about singing from professionals. he built up his technique, and he felt more confident in his dance as the instructors praised him.

but the other kids were good. really good; they almost sounded like professionals. but this didn’t discourage junhui, instead, he used his free time to practice even more, pushing his body to the limits as he often ended up laying on the practice floor room, body aching, unable to move. 

since dorm mates shared the same classes, minghao was with jun for most of the day. they ignored each other, well, minghao did at least. when he wasn’t looking, jun often sneaked glances at minghao and admired his strong body as he danced. he wasn’t half bad at singing either; his voice was sweet and comforting.

one dance class, jun couldn’t get a move down. he didn’t understand how to maneuver his body, and as he was trying to figure it out, he heard the instructor say,

“myungho, go help junhui figure it out”

he half expected minghao to not come, but he heard footsteps approach him, then stop nearby,

“do the move again”

jun tried it, but he just ended up on the floor again. he watched as minghao shook his head, making a little “tsk” sound and walking closer to him,

“nope, not even close. get up”

jun obliged, then felt minghao grab his arm and slowly twist it to replicate the move,

“see, you have to move your arm like this to support yourself. try it again, i’ll guide you”

as soon as minghao touched him, junhui felt like electric sparks ran through his veins from the spot minghao grabbed him. it felt good, almost natural. his hands were soft.

jun did the move again as minghao held him through it, but he still didn’t do it right. partly because he was distracted by minghao touching him. 100% because he was distracted by minghao touching him. 

eventually, jun did it correctly, but minghao made him do it two more times before leaving. jun felt dazed; there was absolutely nothing romantic or sexual about that interaction, but his heart couldn’t stop beating the entire time. when minghao held onto his waist, jun was glad his hair covered his ears, because they had turned beet red.

and the way that minghao diligently and sternly taught the move to him... god. it was hot.

on saturday evening, jun wasn’t feeling too well. he thought he might be getting a cold, so he reluctantly turned down his friends’ offer to go to a norebang, or karaoke place. he wanted to tuck in early this time.

minghao went back to the dorm late; he was usually practicing or hanging out with other kids. so, when junhui opened the door to the dorm to find minghao sobbing his eyes out on the top bunk, he was more than a little shocked to say the least.

like he usually was when he was in shock, jun was frozen. he knew he should probably leave minghao alone, but something about seeing the boy’s shoulders shake as he sobbed made him feel tender. seeing minghao cry didn’t break jun’s heart; it made it fuller, because he just wanted to comfort him and ask him what was wrong.

as was about to shut the door behind him, he saw minghao turn around and look at him. he was about to bolt out of there, but minghao, through teary eyes and a scratchy throat, croaked out,

“j-junhui...?”

jun stayed put. minghao’s voice was soft, not angry or condescending like it usually was. he could tell that minghao was truly hurt over whatever he was crying about,

“i.. i can go, if you want...”  
“no, no please stay...”

minghao turned his body so he was facing jun. he had his legs pulled up to his chest, and his eyes were red and puffy. jun carefully walked across the dorm and sat on jihoon’s bed, not sure where to look. he had never seen minghao this vulnerable.

“c-come up here...”

jun’s stomach did a backflip. he moved towards minghao and up the ladder to his bed almost unconsciously; he was terrified, and wanted to run, but something in him told him he should stay with minghao.

minghao adorably sniffled, looking away from junhui. jun felt his heart ache at the sight of it; he wanted to pull the boy in his arms and hold him on his chest.

jun sat close to minghao, not sure if he should say something. he figured he would talk if he wanted to, which he eventually did,

“i-i thought you were with soonyoung... and jihoon a-and the others at the norebang...”  
“i don’t feel too well, so i skipped out”

jun picked at a small cut on his finger, a nervous tick. he supposed that’s why minghao had let loose in their dorm. like jun, he expected it to be empty. 

another prolonged silence occurred until minghao suddenly whimpered out,

“my... m-my girlfriend broke up with me...”

he let loose a couple tears, which fell silently down his flushed cheeks like raindrops sliding down a window.

junhui stayed silent, but put a tentative hand on the boy’s back and rubbed it. minghao didn’t pull away.

“she... she said that she found... another guy. back in china. t-that long distance wasn’t working anymore, that if i really became a trainee...and lived in korea... i-it could never work out...”

minghao sobbed again, making jun rub his back more, letting his fingers softly graze his shirt. 

“i.. i saw it coming b-but... we had been together for.. almost 2 years... and s-she does it this way? over text? telling me s-she found a better guy?”

junhui just listened; he was an expert at this. he had broken up with someone before, but never been broken up with, which he knew was different. he sympathized with minghao; although he had never gone through what was going through, he understood how devastating and heartbreaking it must be.

heartbreak. that was something jun knew too well.

suddenly, minghao leaned into junhui and rested his head on his shoulder. jun’s heart fluttered for a second, but he let it happen, even wrapping an arm around the boy.

normally, the idea of xu minghao cuddling into him would’ve made junhui’s heart burst out of his chest. but now, he only felt tenderness. he wanted to comfort minghao as best as he could, and he thought that physically doing so would be better than words. he knew that no amount of “i’m sorry’s” “i understand’s” (since he really didn’t) or “you’ll find someone better’s” would help. even if he really did mean them. 

minghao seemed to agree, as he let jun hold him close. the boy buried his face into jun’s neck, softly crying for a bit until they were both completely silent. it wasn’t awkward though; it felt comforting. healing, in a way. 

finally, after a couple minutes, minghao broke the thickening silence,

“junhui...?”

the way minghao said his name made jun feel fuzzy; especially with his slightly scratchy tone from crying. he could listen to it all day.

“yeah...?”  
“i think i’m gay”

junhui’s body stiffened. it felt like a ton of bricks had dropped in his stomach. immediately, his mind raced with thoughts. 

this homophobic jerk was gay?? was he just trying to be funny?? why would he be when he’s in such a vulnerable, emotional state? is this just some weird thing he’s going through because his girlfriend broke up with him?? jun had no damn clue.

he didn’t want to be silent for too long though, so he quickly sputtered out the first thing he could think to say,

“why do you think that?”  
“the whole time i was with my girlfriend, when we kissed and had sex even, it didn’t feel right. it felt like something was missing, i liked her and thought she was really pretty, but it never... clicked. like it seemed to do with my friends who had girlfriends. she was my first girlfriend too, and we had been together so long, and i didn’t even know if i was gay or not i just thought maybe it was her, but i liked her i really did. i was too scared to break it off and lose her, but the turning point really was late last year when i fucking masturbated to... to gay porn. it was so good, it was the best i’ve ever had but it scared me so much. i cried afterwards, because i realized i was gay. like, really realized it. i suppressed that shit for so long, that i convinced myself i was straight. even as a kid i didn’t have any crushes on girls, i liked a boy in my elementary school class and told him i did but he told me that was weird so i cried when i got home and knew that i couldn’t like boys because it was weird......and weird was... bad........”

like light switch, minghao was out. his fuse had burned too brightly, and he was fast asleep on junhui’s shoulder. 

this gave time for jun to think.

minghao was obviously carrying a lot of baggage with him. jun suspected it; often, the people who are the most vocally homophobic were themselves gay, they just used hate to hide the fact that they were scared of who they really were. still didn’t excuse their behavior, though.

he could see himself in this confused, scared minghao. he too experienced that, but at a younger age. whilst junhui didn’t want to completely forgive minghao for the way he treated him, he did understand where a lot of it was coming from. that was a start.

he was glad that minghao wasn’t just an asshole. he was an asshole with some sort of reason; and that was miles better. 

minghao had told him a lot, stuff that he probably hadn’t told anyone else, so jun knew he shouldn’t bring this up to minghao again or anyone else. he was good at keeping secrets anyway. he figured that minghao probably wouldn’t even remember what had happened, his rant, or how clingy he was with jun. he was in such an emotional and exuhasted place, it was likely he might just wake up and not remember at all.

even if junhui kind of wanted him to. he liked this soft minghao; it reminded him of the boy he first fell in love with. it comforted him to know that maybe, just maybe, that boy wasn’t a front. maybe it was the real xu minghao. 

junhui carefully pulled minghao off of his body, laid him in bed and tucked him into his blankets. he slowly descended down the ladder and sneaked into the bathroom, washed his face, brushed his teeth, and slid into bed. 

he could’ve fallen asleep instantly; his focus on minghao made him forget about his feelings of sickness and tiredness. 

but he had one last thought before drifting away. he thought about helping minghao come to terms with his sexuality, with who he really was and to learn that it was okay. that being gay wan’t weird or bad; there were so many more people like him, it was completely natural and valid.

then he thought about them falling in love. naturally, and for real. about them becoming trainees together, stealing kisses in between long practice sessions and “casually” touching each other as they worked on moves, cuddling in bed together after a long day. making out in the darkness of their dorm, trying not to wake the others up. maybe even going further than that.

doing normal couple things. going on dates to the movies, or a cute little coffee shop. maybe even an art gallery; jun could use his cheesy pickup lines that he adored, there were plenty of art ones he could use. his favorite was “i can’t draw hands, can you hold mine for reference?”

debuting together. becoming famous together, maybe even one day making their relationship public. jun wouldn’t care what anyone else had to say; he hoped that by the time that happened, no one would care that they were two men in love. he didn’t want to be like mr. choi and mr. yoon, having to hide their relationship.

but like always, jun was getting ahead of himself. minghao was gay, so what? there’s no guarantee he would like jun. he didn’t know if they could ever even date, considering their past. the chances were unlikely, the odds stacked against them.

so junhui fell asleep. but in his dreams, the thoughts came back.

he hated how crazy for xu minghao he was. 

-

jun woke up and couldn’t breathe. his throat felt scratchy and sore, and his nose was so clogged up that he had to breathe through his mouth.

he, undeniably, had a cold. 

the nurse told him he didn’t have a fever, but he could still be contagious, so he’d have to sleep in the clinic for at least two nights. 

junhui’s first thought upon hearing this was that he hoped he hadn’t gotten minghao sick.

the rest of the day was spent blowing his nose until it turned a dull red and watching anime on his laptop. he particularly enjoyed haikyuu; he could finally catch up on the episodes he missed.

soonyoung graciously brought him a breakfast of dòujiāng and yóutiáo, or deep-fried dough sticks with soy milk. he remembered the street food vendors that sold these, and how he would always buy a couple to eat on his way to school in the morning. they weren’t as delicious as the ones he ate in shenzhen, but he was grateful to have a little piece of home either way, especially when he was feeling under the weather. 

yanan stopped by to give him him some suān là tāng, or hot and sour soup. he had never seen it be served in the dining hall, so he asked yanan where he’d got it from,

“there’s a really good chinese place not too far from here. the food’s almost as good as home; we should go when you’re feeling better”  
“but why’d you get me this? when i was sick, my mom made me chicken soup”  
“you’re all stuffed up dude, you need something spicy to clear up your nose. besides, i know you like spicy food”

yanan stayed and chatted until the nurse kicked him out, saying they couldn’t afford to have too many kids sick at once. 

the next day was monday, and their lessons started again. jun wanted nothing more than to go to them; partly because he was getting restless from being bed-ridden, and partly because he wanted to see minghao.

he hadn’t expected minghao to come and see him anyways. at least he hadn’t gotten sick, since he hadn’t seen him since saturday night. the boy was still fast asleep when jun dragged himself to the nurse yesterday, so he was still uncertain of whether or not minghao even remembered the events of that night. he was desperate to find out.

junhui complied with the nurse and her countless medicines, even the ones that tasted like rotten berries, in an attempt to get better as quickly as he could. that night, he asked the nurse if could go back to his dorm; his throat didn’t hurt as badly, and he could finally breathe out of his nose. 

but she said to wait another day. and another, and one more until it was thursday afternoon and junhui was still stuck in the clinic. his symptoms had worsened; he almost broke a fever the night before. as he sat in bed with a thermometer loosely hanging from his lips, he heard a familiar voice from outside the room that made his stomach flutter,

“but he shouldn’t be contagious right? he’s been in here since sunday”  
“he broke a fever last night, he needs to rest longer”  
“can i at least bring him this?”

jun assumed minghao had held something up, but he could only rely on his hearing to make sense of the conversation; it sounded like the rustle of a paper bag.

“only if you both wear masks and you stay no longer than 5 minutes”  
“okay”

the nurse creaked opened the door to jun’s room,

“there’s someone here to see you, but you’ll have to wear a mask. they’re in that drawer”

she pointed to the bottom drawer of the nightstand next to jun’s bed. he pulled it open and hastily slipped the mask on as minghao walked in.

he had obviously just come from dance practice; he wore a black cap and jacket over a forest green tracksuit. he glistened from sweat, and his black mask looked chic and cool with the rest of his outfit.

jun’s heart skipped a beat; even if sweat majorly grossed him out, he had a thing for guys who looked good when they sweated. minghao was definitely one of those guys.

he held a take-out bag in his right hand, which he placed on the table at the foot of jun’s bed,

“it’s fresh bao”

he said matter-of-factly. his face was expressionless; jun was reminded of when he first met minghao. that same expression plastered on his face... it still fasincatdd jun to this day. he wasn’t someone who could keep his emotions from showing on his face. he’d be terrible at poker.

“oh... thanks”  
“you’ve missed a lot in our lessons. i took the liberty of making a couple videos going over what we learned. i’d suggest you watch them”

he sat at the edge of the bed, pulling his phone out,

“what’s your number? i’ll send them to you”

junhui was taken aback. minghao made videos for him? going over what they had learned? he took the time to do so, and even brought him bao? 

now he was dying to know if the boy remembered saturday night.

he gave minghao his number and immediately received three videos. two of them were of minghao in the practice room, but the other looked like him sitting in their dorm with a guitar. he found it odd, since minghao didn’t focus on singing as much as jun did. he didn’t even know minghao could ply the guitar. but his sick, scattered brain didn’t think too much about it; they didn’t have much time left to talk anyway. jun would watch them later.

before he put his phone away, he saved minghao as “haohao” with a little frog emoji in his contacts.

it was silent. it reminded junhui of the silence they shared saturday night, and now, he was dying to ask minghao about it.

before he could have second thoughts about it, the words slipped out of his mouth,

“ha- minghao... do you wanna talk about satur-“

he was cut off by the beautiful, frog-like eyes shooting daggers at him. jun couldn’t see minghao’s mouth or nose, but his cold, intense gaze told the whole story,

“i would rather eat my own shit than talk about it”  
“but... i want to help-“  
“i don’t need any help. the only thing i want you to do for me is forget it ever happened, okay?”

despiste his harsh words, minghao’s voice quivered. as he finished his sentence, he trailed off and looked away. his elf ears stuck out from under his cap, and junhui watched as they turned a burning red. 

he felt tender again. he could see the scared, lost minghao that he caught a glimpse of that fateful night, and he willed it to come out. to be free, to let someone in, to not be so afraid. there were people who wanted to help.

as jun struggled with what to say next, the nurse slipped her head in,

“time’s up. junhui’s temperature stabilized, so he can go back to his lessons tomorrow”

minghao quickly stood up, thanked the nurse, and left. he did not look at jun again.

that evening, junhui untangled his headphones and watched minghao’s videos. he was better at teaching than jun expected, but he couldn’t focus. he just kept watching his body as he showed off certain moves, listening to his voice as it went over how to do them. he was entranced; he could watch minghao move for hours.

finally, he got to the last video. he eagerly pressed play and was met with minghao looked at the camera, his eyes wide and innocent. he fixed his hair a bit before picking up his guitar and strumming a few simple cords. he did this for a while, but jun could see he wanted to sing; each time he slightly opened his mouth, he quickly shut up, then pouted a bit. junhui wondered if he could get any cuter.

minghao opened his mouth once again, but this time, his actually sang,

“the clock divides the night the midnight into half  
memories   
in the air, my memories are being jumbled  
reminiscing is like a stream, slowly drifting towards the ocean  
constantly reminding myself i need to be stronger, yeah  
songs take flight, those who sing revel in it  
even if i feel small, i too know how to make promises  
the clouds that hang in the sky appear really beautifully  
yet, who would know of the tears they hide  
time goes tick tock, telling me to stop thinking  
then alright, i will take a rest  
this is a night that requires a dream in exchange   
when i send him away, the dreams darken too”

his starts out quiet and unsure, his voice a distant chime in the wind, but as he goes on, minghao sings louder and with more passion until junhui can hear how beautifully he really sings. his voice is soft and comforting, contrasting with his usual cold demeanor, but junhui loved it more because of it. 

and those lyrics...

junhui’s heart was bigger than his chest. he wanted minghao all to himself.

as he was about to replay the video, he got a text from minghao,

“don’t watch that last video. i didn’t mean to send it”  
“too late”

jun replied instantly. minghao took a couple more minutes,

“if you compliment me, i’ll break your arm”  
“u sing beautifully and the lyrics r poetic”  
“i’m outside your door”

junhui chuckled. he rather enjoyed teasing minghao. 

as he fell asleep that night, he thought about getting to see minghao in their lessons tomorrow. he even thought about convincing him to sit with his friends; he’d get a kick out of seeing them interact.

suddnely, xu minghao didn’t seem as frightening, as impossible as he once did. he wasn’t the dream partner that junhui imagined in his mind, this person he longed for even when he knew he shouldn’t.

minghao was just a boy. with flaws, insecurities, and passions, just like jun. 

that made him love him even more.

-

it was break time, and jun was making his way to the practice room to catch up on what he missed when he felt someone grab his arm, stopping him in his tracks.

“if you say a word, we never get to do this again”

junhui couldn’t help but smile as minghao led him down the empty hallway and into a broom closet, shoving him in first before quietly closing the door behind him and turning on the lights.

“what the fuck are you smiling for?”  
“you’re just funny”

minghao wore a long black coat that looked to be of windbreaker material overtop a white gucci shirt (jun had no doubts that it was real) that was tucked into ripped, light wash jeans.

god this boy knew how to dress. he had worn a completely different outfit that morning during lessons, and jun knew he’d change again for their evening ones. 

he suddenly felt insecure over his outfit, even when he had put in more effort today than usual. he usually didn’t care too much about what he wore, but since he’d been wearing mostly pajamas for the week, he decided to dress up a bit with a coral turtleneck layered underneath a black denim jacket and dark jeans. 

wasn’t his fault he wasn’t the only son of a rich family. imagine wearing gucci at 17?

the broom closet was cozy, to put it nicely. they barely squeezed in together, and it faintly smelled. not a good smell. 

minghao looked like he wanted to say something, but like the video in which he sang, he stopped himself, swallowing whatever it was deep inside him. jun decided to be the bold one today,

“what are we doing here?”  
“you aren’t supposed to talk”

jun smiled again. the boy had a plan, clearly, but was getting cold feet. how cute.

“do you finally want to talk about saturday night...?”  
“you’re testing your luck, wen junhui”

jun got chills when minghao said his full name. the way it rolled off his tongue felt good. really good.

“just say it, we don’t have forever-“  
“kiss me”

this also startled minghao, as he turned beet red and frowned, staring at a spot on the wall behind jun. 

but junhui wanted to go with the flow. there wasn’t any time for formalities, for being shy and hesitant. 

they wanted each other. why stop it?

“hm? did i hear that right? you want me to what?”  
“shut your beautiful mouth up and do it”

jun smirked at the sight of the younger boy becoming slightly agitated. his expression was that of annoyance, but his eyes were pleading. he was desperate.

his desperation transferred into his lips, as jun, who didn’t have to lean down much at all, kissed him. 

but for a moment, they both hesitated. because it felt way, way too good to be true. 

later, when recalling the experience, junhui could only describe it as... heavenly. 

it felt like heaven. because it was so natural, so right. junhui could not remember what he thought at the time, because he was only focused on kissing xu minghao that he had no time to think about anything else. he wanted to live in that sensation. 

they hesitated, because it happened so fast. maybe too fast, but who gave a shit? it felt way too good to stop. 

so they didn’t.

jun kissed minghao softly, even if he felt hungry for him and wanted more. he kissed him just once, pausing and moving his lips away from the boy’s for just a moment. but then minghao pressed his lips back, and there was nothing that could stop them now.

they adjusted quickly, figuring out the placement of their head and noses almost automatically. junhui snaked his hands onto minghao’s small waist, feeling him stiffen, but he just as quickly softened under his touch and let him pull him closer. 

but it wasn’t enough. they breathed heavier and heavier as they backed up into the wall, at first jun being the one pressed up against it, but he quickly maneuvered the younger boy so that he was in his position. 

they broke apart to catch their breath. that lasted for about a second.

this time their tongues slipped in, and god did it feel good. it sent shivers down junhui’s spine, and as he kissed and kissed minghao until he thought their lips might go numb, he felt minghao pull away, 

“t-touch me...”

junhui forcefully tugged at minghao’s jacket as he shrugged it off and threw it to wherever. he slipped his hands under the boy’s shirt to feel his toned stomach, the skin smooth and soft. 

minghao let out the smallest of gasps, grabbing junhui’s arms and feeling the muscles in them. jun kissed the boy’s lips a few more times before suddenly planting one on his slender, graceful neck.

minghao moaned. his sweet, tender voice let out a lustful moan that junhui had only even heard in porn. but it sounded even better than those; it sounded like heaven. 

jun kissed and licked the boy’s neck until he knew he should stop, because he could feel blood rushing between his legs. 

and when he grazed his thigh ever so softly again the other boy’s, he could feel the same. 

they couldn’t do it in a broom closet.

“junhui...”

minghao’s lips were red and puffy, like he had just eaten something very spicy. he breathed heavily, they both did, and the air no longer smelled foul and musty. 

it was filled with the sweet, sweet smell of lust, of teenage arousal. 

they locked eyes, trying to catch their breath. then, minghao giggled. he started to giggle, and giggled and giggled and junhui’s heart couldn’t take the sweet sound, the giggle that sounded that bubbles popping.

so as he planted one last kiss on minghao’s delicious lips and retrieved his jacket, he told him,

“your giggle is adorable”  
“i’ve never laughed like that until now”

then, it was silent. but this time, the silence felt awkward. clearly, more should be said, but it seemed like the two boys communicated enough through their stolen kisses. an understanding passed through them, yet, in a soft voice, minghao asked,

“junhui?”  
“mm?  
“i like you... like, that...”

this time, it was jun’s turn to laugh. he laughed, because he couldn’t believe what had just happened. he laughed because minghao liked him so much that he didn’t know what to do about it. maybe he drove him as crazy as minghao drove jun crazy. 

he cupped the boy’s face in his hand, rubbing his thumb against his blushing cheek,

“i thought that was just a friend kiss”  
“god wen junhui, you drive me crazy”

the string untangles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally, some action! next part will be the final part of this teenage era, then a chapter in minghao’s pov. i didn’t plan to split this era up so much, but i have a lot of ideas, and i didn’t want chapters to be too long. i’ll try to publish the next chapter quickly. all i’ll say is that this era probably ends in the saddest way.
> 
> just to be clear, this is occurring in mid-april of 2014. that’ll be more important next chapter.
> 
> i imagine junhui having his long black hair from predebut, and minghao having his swoop-y hair from boomboom era, but in a brown color!
> 
> for seungcheol and jeonghan, i imagined them looking like they did in the going seventeen “logic night” episodes (i described their suits accordingly), and the second minghao outfit described is based off his airport outfit on 170922. i’d link a pic, but i’m not sure if i can :(
> 
> thank you for anyone supporting this!! all the kudos are appreciated <3


	5. yr 3- 2014 (pt 3)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “wait before u go!!”  
> “?”  
> “... it’s kinda embarrassing”  
> “it’s okay, say it”  
> “... what if we’re tied by the string? we met again after so many years and in a completely different country,, that’s kinda crazy right?”  
> “it’s just a freak sort of coincidence don’t you think? but i suppose we could be. we found each other again after all that time”  
> “true... but u never know hehe~”  
> “yeah. goodnight, junhui”  
> “goodnight minghao <33~~”
> 
> *WARNING: MAJOR CHARACTER INJURY. NOTHING GRAPHIC DESCRIBED*  
> *DON’T READ NOTES UNTIL END IF YOU DON’T WANT TO BE SPOILED*

the warmth of his long fingers flowed throughout junhui’s body as they grazed along his arm, bending it to the right position. 

jun was glad he wasn’t wearing tight pants. 

“up, like this... then, as you do the spin, your arm comes down,”

minghao guided jun’s arm down,

“like this”

suddnely, as minghao let go of jun, he felt a chill that snaked its way down his spine upon feeling long fingers grazing his inner thigh.

it happened for a second. maybe even a millisecond. but it was all it took for junhui to not turn around to face the rest of the students for the remainder of class and to constantly adjust his pants.

fucking xu minghao. 

as the class dismissed and everyone hurried to lunch, jun hung back, but he heard familiar voices bickering behind him,

“... why would i steal your deodorant, soonyoung? what purpose would it serve for me?”  
“then if it wasn’t you, who was it?”  
“you probably just lost it, idiot!”

jun turned around; his situation downstairs had mostly cleared up,

“you’re still arguing about the deodorant?”  
“because i still haven’t found it! it was my favorite, it smelled like the ocean”  
“just buy another one....”

jihoon attempted to look mad, but as he turned away, jun could see the blossoming of a goofy smiling. he smiled; jihoon’s crush on soonyoung was apparent to everyone but soonyoung of course. jun encouraged the boy to pursue his feelings, but he denied he even had them in the first place. 

he wished minghao and jihoon would formally meet. they had a lot in common.

speaking of the devil, he was the only one left in the room besides them. junhui knew it wasn’t a coincidence.

he turned to his friends,

“i’m gonna practice my piece for a little longer. save me a seat at lunch?”

soonyoung frowned,

“dude, you’ve been working nonstop the past few days. you should rest your muscles a little; auditions are in two days, you wouldn’t want to get into an injury”

jihoon nodded in agreement. 

jun felt bad lying to his friends. he really did, but the fact that auditions were in two days was exactly the reason he had to “practice” more.

“it’ll only be for like 5 minutes, i wanna go over the last part since i haven’t really nailed it”  
“then we’ll stay with you, weve been wanting to watch you dance anyway”

the two seemed eager, but jun caught a glimpse of minghao on the other side of the room, who shook his head, tapping his foot impatiently.

sighing, jun turned back to jihoon and soonyoung,

“i appreciate it, really, but i don’t want you guys missing lunch. i’ll show it to everyone tomorrow, okay?”  
“fineeee, i can’t argue with you anyways. just be careful, okay?”

as soonyoung slapped jun on the back and walked away, the two began bickering again,

“so you can’t argue with him, but can with me?”  
“jun’s too nice, you’re just mean”  
“mean?! what have i ever done to you??”  
“stolen my deodorant!”

luckily, they didn’t notice minghao lurking in the corner as they left, their bickering echoing down the hallway until it was swallowed up as they entered the dining hall.

the boy in the corner wore a striped shirt loosely tucked into jeans. of course he wore jeans during dance lessons. his outfit was simple, but anything he wore looked incredible on him. simple as that.

junhui ignored him at first, and actually started working on his routine, but he was quickly interrupted by a soft hand that wrapped around his wrist,

“and just what do you think you’re doing...?”

he pretended to not hear him and continued dancing. he went on for a while until finally, he was stopped yet again, this time, minghao spun him around and held his waist,

“why are you practicing after class, wen junhui?”  
“because i wanted to get some extra practice in. duh”

jun smirked as minghao attempted to push him against the wall. he was strong, but jun resisted. he wanted to prolong this.

he was eventually pushed back, but he couldn’t wipe the smirk off his face,

“what are you smirking at....”  
“you. you’re cute”  
“shut up”

jun held the boy’s waist softly, pulling him closer,

“why are you so interested in me, xu minghao?”  
“none of your concern. i should shut you up so you can’t talk back”  
“how will you shut me up?”

he already knew the answer. but his heart still fluttered out of his body as minghao kissed him, just once. 

they broke apart, jun using this opportunity to push minghao against the wall,

“i can still talk. maybe you should do it again”

he chuckled into their next kiss, this one longer. they stayed like that, intertwined in each other’s enticing lips until minghao brought his hand a little too far down.

jun pulled away, minghao quickly doing the same,

“s.. sorry, i got too into it...”  
“it’s fine, i just wasn’t expecting it”

feeling embarrassed, jun ran a hand through his hair and tentatively grabbed minghao’s hand,

“just, not in here, yeah?”  
“mhm. that’d be pretty uncomfortable anyway”

he smiled, instantly making jun feel at ease. he smiled back and planted a quick kiss on the boy’s forehead,

“feeling okay about auditions?”

minghao suddenly frowned, sighing,

“i wish. it feels like i’ve been practicing nonstop, but i still don’t have it completely down. i need to eat, breathe, and sleep this routine...”

junhui greatly admired minghao’s perfectionism and hard-working nature, but he could see himself in the boy’s drive. they both strived for perfection, even when it didn’t exist. they’d overwork themselves until their muscles screamed at them to stop, and even then, they’d go one more time. 

jun was trying to be less hard on himself, but he was more worried about minghao. he took every little mistake like it was an indication that he wasn’t good, even when it was clear he was one of the best dancers among the students. no one else could b-boy, as far as jun knew, and certainly no one could b-boy as well as minghao did. he expertly twisted his body around to the point where it looked like he was an actual spinning top; seemingly needing little to no momentum to turn. 

it was amazing. he was so talented, jun knew he’d pass the audition. no doubt about it.

he just hoped they’d pass together.

junhui wrapped an arm around minghao,

“hao hao, you’ve already got the choreo down, i know it. you’ll pass, okay? rest your body; you don’t wanna risk injuring yourself before the audition”  
“don’t call me hao hao. and you’re right, i just need it to be perfect...”  
“whatever you say, hao hao. perfection doesn’t exist”

he laughed as the boy pouted, punching his arm. he knew he loved being called hao hao; and various other pet names that junhui could only call him over text. ones that if he repeated out loud, he’d risk getting attacked by minghao.

he was planning on doing so that night anyway.

now came the part they both dreaded. even if the practice room was anything but private, and was generally a bit musty and had a lingering odor of sweat at all times, it was like a sanctuary to the them. no one ever came after class or during lunch, so they could be in private. anywhere else was too risky; even their precious broom closest where their first stolen kiss occurred was tainted, since a leak occurred in there and maintenance had been trying to fix it for the past week.

so the practice room was the only place they could be alone. and in a way, their love stayed with it. their intense, passionate make outs occurred only in there, and outside, they barely acknowledged each other. it frustrated jun, but he understood that minghao was still coming to terms with his sexuality and understanding who he was. besides, he knew their relationship wouldn’t exactly fly with most of the kids there. but sometimes, minghao’s harsh words from so long ago would replay in his mind, and he’d have doubts. 

what if minghao was just using him? what if he really wasn’t gay, if he was just stringing him along and using him for some sick joke? 

it made his stomach churn at the thought of it all being fake again, but too often than not, his worries melted upon being reunited with the boy in the practice room and feeling his soft lips so eager to kiss his. his small waist fitting so perfectly into junhui’s hands, his lean body loosening under his touch. all of it. he could feel how intoxicated minghao was by him, and it gave him a sort of euphoria that he didn’t know he could experience. 

but then he’d be anxious again and think that it was all too good to be true. 

he wondered if he should say something to minghao about it. 

but, their time was running out. minghao turned to junhui and rested his head on his shoulder. jun rubbed the boy’s back, and felt him mumble,

“i don’t wanna go....”  
“i know, neither do i... but...”

he hesitated, making minghao look up at him. 

it wasn’t even technically a date, he supposed. but they hadn’t actually been anywhere outside before together, since they were usually busy with practice anyway, but tomorrow was their chance. they had the day off to rest before auditions, so really, it’d be their last chance in a while, if all goes well and they both become trainees together. their schedules would become even more packed, and attempting to juggle trainee life with their relationship would definitely prove to be difficult.

their relationship. even that was not technically real, since they hadn’t actually asked each other out. they mostly just made out and talked over text about their lives or other interests. they always seemed to dance around the topic of what they really were, or at least, minghao did. junhui once asked what their relationship was, and minghao said he didn’t want to talk about it. he pressed on, but was ultimately too scared to upset the boy and dropped it.

that just gave him more reason to worry about his intentions. but he had hope that eventually, they’d be a normal couple. 

and asking minghao out to see the cherry blossoms at the park before they died out then going to the chinese restaurant nearby seemed like a good start. 

he took a deep breath and said,

“i... was thinking maybe we could go out together? tomorrow, since we don’t have lessons. you know the park nearby? they have cherry blossoms, and they’re gonna die out soon, so we could go see them before they do, then there’s that chinese restaurant nearby, i think that’s where you got that really good bao you gave me when i was sick, so-“

he was stopped by minghao’s lips pressing against his. hao kissed him once before pulling away and nodding, a small smile forming from his sweet lips,

“yeah, that sounds cool. i’m down”

he nodded assuringly then squeezed jun’s hand. jun felt himself relax; he hadn’t expected minghao to reject him, but he was prepared for his usual hesitance and reluctance. junhui was pleasantly surprised by his reaction, and hoped it meant that it really was the first step to a normal relationship.

as they walked into the dining hall, minghao going past jun to his friends at a table in the corner, junhui sat down at the nearby table with his friends, who had already graciously brought him food,

“jun!! we thought you’d miss lunch, so we got you some food. you should eat, you spend too much practicing”

soonyoung pushed the plate of food at jun as he sat down. it looked good, and he was hungry, so he quickly stuffed his mouth. as he did, he listened to the conversation around him,

“so we’re all still on for the arcade tomorrow?”  
“yeah! wait, have we told jun about it?”

yanan turned to jun, who had stopped eating and was chewing his last bite as he met his friend’s eyes,

“what’s going on?”  
“we were all making plans to go to this arcade that hansol’s been to a few times, it’s not too far away. since it’s our day off, you know? it could be fun”

junhui had not planned for this possibility. he, as bad as it sounded, completely forgot about his friends, and the fact that they’d probably want to hang out tomorrow too. 

for a second, he thought about just telling them he couldn’t. what if it conflicted with his plans with minghao? they’d ideally want to see the cherry blossoms during daylight, so around noon, then get lunch at the chinese place...

then he had a second thought. what if he brought minghao along to the arcade, or brought his friends to his outing with minghao? secretly, he really did want them to get along. he’d think it’d be really fun to hang out with all of them together, and he knew that minghao and him could be themselves and not risk being harassed, since his friends were accepting of a gay relationship... but it could never work out. minghao might accept it, but he’d probably never be affectionate with jun around them, even if he knew they wouldn’t care. besides, most of his friends weren’t particularly fond of minghao anyway, especially yanan; they thought he was arrogant and full of himself. even if they acknowledged his talent, they still believed that he had bought his way in to the company. 

of course he couldn’t have the two parties meet. yanan knew all about what happened with them in middle school, how weird would it be if they suddenly turned up declaring that they were dating? it would take so much explaining, and there wasn’t any guarantee they’d all get along. it was just too complicated.

so now, jun had to make a choice. his friends, or minghao? the boy he loved, but wasn’t even technically his boyfriend? 

instantly, junhui felt himself sway towards minghao. he could hang out with his friends at any other time; this could be him and minghao’s last chance. 

before he got even more carried away, jun asked,

“what time were you planning on going?”  
“maybe around lunch time? we could have lunch then go to the arcade. why, did you have other plans?”

jihoon suddenly fixated on junhui. besides yanan, jun felt the closest with jihoon; he was very intelligent, and often understood jun’s temperament and worries without having to say a word. 

and now, jun could tell jihoon knew something was up. but he was certain the boy would never know the truth; him thinking that jun wanted to go on a date with xu minghao was surely the farthest thing from his mind. 

“i.. no, i just like knowing ahead of time. but i might have to dip a little early, i promised my mom that i’d facetime her tomorrow, and she’s probably only available at around...4. that’s when she gets off work.”

jun hated how easily that lie slipped out. he hated lying in general, but he couldn’t think of a better excuse. he watched as his friends nodded, soonyoung smiling and pumping a fist into the air,

“yeah!! that’s okay, as long as we get to hang out with you! you’ve been so busy practicing, you didn’t go to the norebang last week with us either. we wanna hang out with you, jun”

everyone agreed, and jun quickly brushed his hair over his ears as they began to turn red. he was feeling embarrassed over the attention on him, but also felt guilty knowing he’s made his friends feel that way. they all were usually busy with lessons, but during their little free time, jun spent it all with minghao. he admittedly neglected his friends, and it was catching up to him. this group of friends, even if jun had only known most of them for a little over a week, were the best he’s ever had. the thought of losing them was painful; he couldn’t risk it. he had to go with them. 

as they walked out of the dining hall after lunch was over, junhui realized that this arcade outing didn’t completely ruin his plans with minghao. they could still go to see the cherry blossoms, it’d still be light outside at 4. they could just eat at the chinese restaurant at dinner. yeah, that was perfect! junhui calmed down, and felt more at ease throughout the rest of the day. like usual, he had gotten so into his head that he hadn’t stopped to think about the obvious solutions to his own problems. jun, as crazy as he thought his thoughts were, wished he could share them with someone. he’d talk with yanan a bit, but would never fully reveal his inner turmoil. minghao was the only person he could imagine doing thsi with, but even then, something stopped him from doing so. maybe it was minghao’s demeanor of generally brushing things off, or not taking things too seriously. he was worried that he’d scare him off, make him think that jun was a weirdo for having such confusing and conflicting thoughts. 

even as junhui laid in bed that night, his mind continued to think. this night was particularly worse than others; there was no shutting his brain off as it ran in constant loops, cycling between the same few worries and fixating on them until jun wanted to pull out his brain and throw it away, to not have to deal with his headache-inducing worries. at the very least, he just wanted to scream.

he slipped his phone off the nightstand and checked the time. 12:34 AM. there was still a chance that minghao was awake; he knew that just because the boy was above him was silent didn’t mean he was asleep; he could stay eerily still at times.

so, he texted the person called “haohao 🐸💕” in his contacts,

“u up?”

immediately, hao responded,

“yeah. can’t sleep?”  
“no... i wanna cuddle :(“  
“sadly we can’t”  
“don’t need 2 remind me...”  
“are you worrying about auditions?”  
“no about tmrw”  
“well, tomorrow will be our first date, so i can see why you’re nervous”

junhui’s heart fluttered. minghao had actually called it a date... that was big.

“mhm :( but also...”  
“?”  
“at lunch my friends invited me 2 go 2 this arcade but at noon... when we were gonna have our date...”  
“did you tell them you already had plans?”  
“no, i felt bad... so im gonna go with them but we can still have our date tmrw but @ maybe 4? the sun should still b up so we can see the cherry blossoms then go 2 chinese place 4 dinner”

minghao took a little longer to respond after that. junhui felt anxious, he hoped he hadn’t upset minghao by pushing their date back...

“okay, that’s fine, but when were you planning on telling me?”  
“i was too nervous 2 say :( i didn’t have much time anywayz but if i didn’t text u today i would’ve told u tmrw morning”  
“should’ve told me sooner :/ i was thinking about hanging out with other friends, but it’s okay, we’ll have our date later then”  
“im sorry hao hao :(“  
“it’s okay baby, i’m just glad we can still see the cherry blossoms before they go away~”

junhui just knew the boy was smirking, but upon reading “baby”, he couldn’t help but let out a little squeal. this time, he heard minghao from above chuckle.

he could *not* believe that minghao just called him baby. he’d never call him any sort of pet name before, and now he does it so casually? what a fucking tease, jun thought....

“U CAN’T JUST CALL ME BABY LIKE THAT....”  
“who says i can’t, baby? better be quiet before you wake soonyoung or jihoon up”  
“i’m pouting right now :(“  
“cute”

jun thought he might die on the spot. 

“now im rly not gonna b able to sleep...”  
“what do you usually do when you can’t sleep?”  
“i read but i can’t turn on any lights :(“  
“what’s your favorite story?”  
“well when i was younger my mom told me abt the story of the red string of fate,, have u heard of it?”  
“yeah. how it’s like, two people are connected by the red string, which is fate i guess. it’s traditionally tied around the ankles of the two lovers, but now, it’s more commonly depicted as being tied around the little fingers”  
“u sure know a lot abt it”  
“i know way too much about chinese folklore and mythology. my parents are bonkers about that stuff”  
“u never talk about ur parents :0”  
“for good reason. you know that they actually arranged for me to marry this girl that was the daughter of a family friend when i was like 10? but they didn’t tell me until a few years later, and i went behind their back and dated my now ex-girlfriend. they didn’t like her, but i didn’t care. i just wanted to go against them. they don’t even know we broke up...”  
“i’m sorry baby :((“  
“yeah well, i don’t wanna talk about it anymore. so why do you like the red string of fate story?”  
“i think it’s romantic :( always being connected 2 ur soulmate no matter what happens or how far apart u are... it’s like the string can tangle but never break,, u know?”  
“i mean, if it’s even real. do you think it is then?”  
“i hope it is... what do u think?”  
“i don’t really buy it. i mean, theres not a literal string around everyone’s fingers connecting them to their one true love or whatever, but even the whole concept of a soulmate seems a bit flawed. is there really only one person out there that’s your true match? how do you know you’ll meet? what if you meet them in passing, but you don’t know it’s them because they’re just some random person on the street? can we only be with our soulmates to be happy?”  
“when u put it like that,, ur right :( it seems too good to be true”  
“sorry, that probably didn’t really help you go to sleep...”  
“it’s okay! ur cute when ur all deep like that hehe,, also i’m getting sleepy”  
“good. i’m gonna sleep though, i’m getting tired too. talk to you tomorrow baby?”  
“mhm! goodnight hao hao <3”  
“wait before u go!!”  
“?”  
“... it’s kinda embarrassing”  
“it’s okay, say it”  
“... what if we’re tied by the string? we met again after so many years and in a completely different country,, that’s kinda crazy right?”  
“it’s just a freak sort of coincidence don’t you think? but i suppose we could be. we found each other again after all that time”  
“true... but u never know hehe~”  
“yeah. goodnight, junhui”  
“goodnight minghao <33~~”

-

the next morning at breakfast, junhui couldn’t help but sneak glances at minghao’s table even more than usual. he’d only meet the boy’s eye occasionally, but when they did, minghao would flash a smirk before going back to talking to his friends. even if no one really noticed, and they technically weren’t, jun felt like they were doing something forbidden. all in all, their love felt like that; forbidden. in so many ways. 

but that just makes it more tempting, doesn’t it?

jun took an extra longer shower and took his time getting ready; he hadn’t had so much time to himself for a while, and it felt good, but he still had that feeling like he should he doing something. luckily, his friends wanted to go to the arcade sooner, and get lunch before heading over. they took the subway, as it was too far by foot. 

the restaurant they picked turned out to be pretty damn good, and they spent a while there (soonyoung and chan kept ordering more servings of dessert) before heading to the arcade that was across the street.

jun didn’t go to the arcade as often as other kids did, and he wasn’t as into games as them either, but the moment the group stepped inside, jun was immediately hooked in.

the arcade was gigantic; it had two floors and a cafe on the third, with every inch of wall space covered by a different game. people of all ages crowded around the machines, the air clouded by the beeps, buzzes, and blaring sirens of the games. bright, colorful lights flashed from every corner, and it smelled like a mix of hand sanitizer and sickly sweet candy. 

junhui couldn’t wait to join.

they excitedly received wristbands that allowed them to play nearly any game they wanted. immediately, soonyoung turned to the others,

“okay, we gotta rack up as many tickets as possible. i want that tiger plushie, and it’s 10,000 tickets, so it won’t be easy”

soonyoung’s odd obsession with tigers amused jun. it reminded him of minghao’s obsession with frogs, or, his past obsession. the boy had not mentioned frogs once since they met for the second time, so junhui assumed he was over it. it disappointed him, though. he found it endearing. 

soonyoung and minghao really could’ve gotten along, thought jun. he suddenly wished minghao was there with him, wristband and all, ready to play the games. but minghao didn’t really strike him someone who would enjoy this sort of atmosphere. it’d make for a fun date, though...

the boys had a blast; they went around to as many machines as they could, seeing which would give the most tickets for the least amount of effort. between the 7 of them, they managed to gain 10,000 tickets in no time. 

jihoon went to exchange the tickets for the tiger plushie, resulting in an overly-eager soonyoung hugging a furiously blushing jihoon.

they challenged each other to DDR, and junhui proved to be the best one at it. he even drew up a bit of a crowd as he put some flare into it, practically dancing his routine up on the small stage.

whilst playing a round of air hockey, junhui decided he’d go take a look at the prizes, since they’d earned a considerable number of tickets after acquiring soonyoung’s tiger plush. 

the large stuffed animals hanging from a metal rack near the top immediately caught his eye. there was soonyoung’s tiger, a cat... dog... rabbit...

and there, nestled between a rabbit and dolphin, was a frog plushie.

but not just any frog plushie. it was the exact same one that jun’s little brother, yang yang, adored.

the same one minghao had as a kid. well, not the exact same one, but it was definitely from the same brand. it had the same smile, same soft, velvet-y green fur. 

without even thinking, junhui asked the tired-looking employee,

“how much is the frog?”  
“10,000... it’s says it there-“  
“ah...”

jun was just shy of 10,000 tickets. he took a closer look at the employee, who was the only one at the counter. he was in his early-mid 20’s, his black curly hair slightly touseled. he wore glasses, but they didn’t cover his tired, slightly sad eyes. his name tag read “wonwoo”

“um... i’ll be back when i have more”  
“no, it’s okay kid, look”

he looked around; there was no one even near them. wonwoo grabbed a long metal pole with a hook at the end and fished the frog out of the rack, pushing it at jun,

“just give me what you have and take it”  
“really?”  
“yeah, it’s not a big deal. it’s just a plushie”

even if it really wasn’t a big deal, junhui appreciated wonwoo’s generosity nevertheless; jun got the impression that the man was overworked, or going through something, as his eyes radiated a sort of pain that junhui had learned to read. also, he knew that some employees wouldn’t even think about giving him the frog if he didn’t have the adequate amount of tickets. 

and he really wanted that frog. no, he needed it.

he quickly thanked the man, gave him the tickets, and scurried away with the frog in his arms.

as he passed, he snuck a glance at the clock on the wall nearby. 

4:30.

...

it was already 4:30?!?!

he was late; he had lost track of time so badly that he was late to his date with minghao. 

as fast as jun could, he ran to the air hockey table, apologizing to the people he bumped into with the giant frog in his arms,

“jun! woah that’s a huge frog, didn’t think you’d like plush-“  
“i’m late, it’s already 4:30, i promised my mom i’d facetime her at 4, so i need to go back to the dorms okay?”  
“alone? you sure you don’t want one of us to go with you? we could all go, we’ve already been here for a while...”  
“no! no it’s fine, i don’t want to interrupt your fun, i’ll be fine, i’ll call you guys later!!”

he heard his friends calling his name, but he ignored them. it stung, but all that was on his mind was minghao. curse him for always having his phone on silent; he didn’t know if he had texted or called him.

and now he was stuck with a huge frog plush, and there wasn’t any time to maneuver himself to grab his phone and hold the frog. 

the subway ride took another 10 minutes, but it felt like an eternity to junhui. a few people stared at the giant frog he carried, making him feel even more anxious. he nearly got off on the wrong stop, but finally, he made it back to the sc building. he hurried into the lobby, sat on a couch, and pulled out his phone,

2 missed calls. 4 texts,

“hey, you ready for our date?”  
“still at the arcade?”  
“i’ll be waiting at the park, so meet me there”  
“junhui?”

he cursed himself for losing track of time as he jolted outside. luckily the park was only a couple minutes away, but it wasn’t exactly easy walking with the giant frog. he hadn’t realized that it was a bit inconvenient to carry around, and was considering turning back to put the frog in his dorm when he heard his name being called,

“junhui!!”

he couldn’t see minghao, but heard footsteps running towards him,

“woah, where’d you get that... wait...”

there was a bench a few feet away, so jun plopped down on it and set the frog next to him. minghao sat on the other side,

“is that my frog??”  
“yeah... i saw it at the arcade... and i thought of you so i got it...”

he was still out of breath from running to the park, so as he caught his breath, he watched minghao’s eyes light up like street lamps as he touched the plushie’s fur. he smiled, the little dimples forming on the corners of his dazzling grin. jun hadn’t seen minghao that happy in a very, very long time,

“it’s really my frog!!”  
“i had to get it for you, b... baby...”

he watched hao’s cheeks turn pink; he couldn’t wipe the smile off his face, but neither could jun. it was clear his love for frogs was very much alive,

“i didn’t think they’d still make them, since i got mine when i was so young... then i lost it! but wow... thank you, junhui”

minghao leaned over and quickly kissed jun’s cheek. jun’s ears turned beet red, his heart pounding at an alarming rate. he loved seeing this soft, excited minghao. he’d give him all the frog plushies in the world if it meant he’d see minghao smile like that.

they decided that the frog was too big to lug around on their date, especially if they took it inside the restaurant, so they headed back to the dorm. minghao excitedly placed it on his bed, and it took up half of the space. he wondered how minghao would sleep with it, if that’s what he intended to do. that’d be too cute to see....

as they headed back out, it was nearly 5, and the sun was beginning to descend over the horizon. the sky looked like an artist’s palette; a swirly mix of blue, pink, and orange. a breeze had picked up, causing the trees to whistle in the wind. junhui loved the sound of trees in the wind; it reminded him of home, in shenzhen. he used to live across from a park, and he’d go there frequently, no matter the weather. it was a good place to practice his singing too, since it was usually empty during the day when junhui was taking online classes and all the other kids were at school. it was the only good part of living in that apartment.

they entered the park and were immediately greeted by the cherry blossoms. they were strikingly pink; more pink than jun would’ve thought. he could tell they were well past full bloom, though; a couple trees looked wilted, their petals hanging loosely as if by a thread on the thin branches.

but they were still beautiful. they gave off a faint aroma too, one of freshness, of sweetness, but a very natural sweetness. like honeysuckle, but lighter. more flowery.

junhui imagined how beautiful it would be to have a picnic here. the sun shining through the baby pink petals, tickling jun’s skin as he sat on a blanket on the velvety grass. eating a packed lunch, watching people go about their lives. biking. families pushing strollers. couples holding hands. 

he imagined going on a date like that with minghao. a cherry blossom picnic date. 

he’d want nothing more in life.

the park was near empty, and as the two walked through, admiring the trees and other flowers that beautifully bloomed, junhui felt soft finger graze his palm. he bumped his shoulder into minghao’s, and they stayed connected like that.

but when minghao reached out and curled his long hand into jun’s, it felt so good. too good. 

as they walked through the cherry blossom park hand in hand, junhui forgot about his worries. about whether or not minghao’s feelings were genuine. about passing the auditions tomorrow. about what would happen if he didn’t.

right now, all that mattered was circling his thumb across minghao’s hand that firmly held his. feeling the cool evening breeze ripple his shirt. admiring the trees that, despite their falling flowers and dried-out appearance, were still as breathtaking as jun imagined them.

for the first time in a long time, maybe even in forever, junhui felt at peace. truly at peace.

they were both getting hungry, so they headed back out of the park to go eat at the chinese restaurant. as they neared the exit, minghao let go of jun’s hand. it fell limply to junhui’s side. he understood why, but it still hurt him. 

he didn’t care who saw. who judged. he just wanted to hold hands with xu minghao.

the food was delicious, and was the closest thing to what home tasted like to jun. they were both quiet eaters, so they ate with little conversation. but again, it didn’t feel awkward. they simply enjoyed each other’s presence as they enjoyed their food.

but towards the end, jun felt a hand touch his thigh. he looked at minghao, who stared at him. his eyes were questioning, so jun nodded.

minghao rubbed jun’s thigh for the rest of their time there, and even held his hand for a bit. junhui thanked god they had a booth table.

the sun was rapidly setting when they stepped out of the restaurant. strokes of red and orange were the only colors left on the palette. 

they knew they didn’t have much time; this could be their only chance. the other boys could be back at the dorm by now.

so they returned to the park, which appeared to be completely empty. they found a bench to sit at, and minghao rested his head on junhui’s shoulder whilst jun cuddled the boy close. they uttered not a single word.

it was beautiful. jun could’ve, and would’ve, stayed like that forever. 

especially if he had known what the next day held. 

as petals died off and floated down to the ground, only to be carried away by the wind, journeying to another home, junhui broke the silence,

“feeling okay about the audition?”  
“did you really need to bring it up?”  
“sorry, sorry”

jun paused. but minghao responded anyway,

“it’s fine... i just don’t want to think about that now. i still feel like i won’t pass”  
“you will, hao”  
“so will you. you’re so talented in singing and dancing”  
“when we become trainees together, can you promise me one thing”  
“what is it?”  
“that we make it? together? that we become famous. me a famous singer, maybe actor if that doesn’t work out, and you a dancer”  
“i’m not sure if we can promise something like that, junhui...”  
“we can. because i know could; we, and especially you, have that determination. it feels like you have no choice but to succeed, right? that’s why you work so hard. no one here tries as hard as you do. and it shows”  
“... yeah. i just have to make it. i’ve spent my whole life doing dance. it’s.... just a part of me as my arms. my nose. anything, you get it...”  
“i feel the same way too. but we’ve worked so hard, i know it’ll pay off. so promise me that we’ll succeed, okay?”

minghao nodded, and they faced each other. jun held out his pinky,

“pinky promise?”  
“really..?”  
“come on... please?~”

he made a pouty face. minghao sighed, then interlocked his pinky with junhui’s. he gave him a quick kiss,

“the things you make me do...”  
“you drive me crazy too, xu minghao”

as the last slivers of light died off, they hurried back to the dorms before they were stuck in pitch-black darkness. 

they walked through the empty lobby, and as they walked up the stairs to their dorm, minghao turned to jun,

“junhui?”  
“mm”  
“... will you be my boyfriend?”

junhui’s heart soared into the stratosphere until he was certain it reached another galaxy. laughing, he grabbed minghao’s hands and kissed them before kissing his lips, saying,

“oh so NOW you ask?? what were we before, hm? just bros being bros?”

that sent minghao into a giggle fit, heightened by jun tickling the boy’s sides. his giggle was the sweetest sound junhui had ever heard; they were like bubbles popping. 

if he could make minghao laugh like that, junhui knew he’d died happily. 

exhausted from the day’s activities, jun fell asleep immediately. but not before thinking about the red string of fate legend.

he hoped their pinky promise would last. that their string would stay taut, smooth, and tangle-free.

-

the morning was a blur. they were awoken at the crack of dawn to eat a quick breakfast before being hustled into a waiting room, being given their name tags and told how they would be auditioned. they’d first go in their dorm groups, to perform the group choreography that they’d be learning for the past 3 weeks. then, they’d be called individually to perform whatever solo piece they had prepared. 

dorm groups were split up, so jun didn’t get a chance to see soonyoung, jihoon, or minghao. he was with yanan and joshua though, so they nervously chatted and went over their routines together. 

finally, jun was called up. he made a thumbs-up gesture to his friends before following a staff and entering a small room.

soonyoung and jihoon were already there, talking in a hushed tone to each other. they stopped upon seeing junhui, and smiled nervously at him.

then, minghao walked in. he nodded at soonyoung and jihoon before fixating on jun. he did not nod, or smile, or make any sort of gesture that would indicate he was aware of junhui’s presence, but he could see his eyes. they were soft, but encouraging. jun could finally read minghao, and felt comforted by his reassuring expression.

jun fumbled a bit in one part, but he managed to keep going. it seemed to have impressed the judges, who all looked at each other in what appeared to shock; jun couldn’t read them as well. they were quickly ushered out into a separate waiting room and were told they could go eat lunch and would be called alphabetically to do their solo audition.

but as junhui turned to minghao, a staffed called his name. they whispered something to him; hao seemed confused, almost angry, but he was quickly escorted to another room where jun assumed they would hold the solo auditions. 

he was tempted to follow, but he heard soonyoung behind him,

“what do you think that was for? do you think they’re testing him now?”  
“see, he always gets special treatment...probably giving him his contract now, since his dad paid to get him in...”

junhui stayed silent. he understood why his friends were upset, but he couldn’t participate in their gossip. not when he knew that minghao worked just as hard, if not harder, than anyone else here to get to this position.

they ate lunch, jun hurriedly gulping it down to go back and practice his routine more. 

he was getting worried about minghao; the audition shouldn’t have taken that long, and he hadn’t showed up to lunch. junhui could barely focus on his piece; all he could think about was hao.

before he knew it, a staff walked into the room, staring at a paper on a clipboard,

“moon.. junhwi?”

jun knew that was him, so he hurried over.

he entered the room that minghao had earlier. it was even smaller than the previous one, and 4 judges, including the ceo and his assistant, were sat at a table in the back. the staff told them his name, then closed the door behind her.

the ceo, mr choi, smiled at jun,

“hello, junhwi. we’ll play the song you’ve chosen to perform when you’re ready, just tell us when. you have as much time as you need”

junhui knew that the more he stalled, the more anxious he’d get, so he quickly asked for the music.

when looking back on the experience, jun remembered almost nothing. he was so concentrated and focused that he couldn’t afford to think about anything else; just him and his body, then him and his voice as he sang.

in a flash, it was over. he barely had time to reflect on how he did before being shepherded out of the room again.

his head spinning, he wandered around the building a bit, not knowing where his friends were. all he really wanted was to see minghao, but there was hardly anyone around, and anyone he did asked said they hadn’t seen him.

by now it was nearing 5 pm, and junhui had gone back to his dorm. he was anxiously texting his mom about the audition when the door burst open, soonyoumg and jihoon running in,

“JUN JUN JUN WE GOT IN WE ALL GOT IN!!!!”

they tackled jun and hugged him, breaking apart as soonyoung ran around the room screaming,

“WE PASSED WE PASSED WE PASSED!!!”

incredibly confused, junhui sputtered,

“w-what do you mean?? i thought they didn’t release the results until tomorrow?”  
“they released them early!! only 8 people passed and all of us made it!!!”

jihoon smiled brightly at jun, who was still in shock.

he made it.... he made it!!

excitement filled up his chest as he jumped up and laughed, hugging soonyoung and jihoon.

but as his euphoria calmed down, he realized there was an 8th person that passed that wasn’t part of their 7-person friend group.

minghao. it had to be him.

he quickly turned to the other two,

“who was the 8th person??”  
“huh?? oh i didn’t check, i just saw our names and sprinted back to tell you!!!”  
“do you think it was minghao?? have you seen him around?”  
“minghao?? why do you care about him, i haven’t seen him, maybe they kicked him out because they didn’t want someone who paid their way in to be a trainee”  
“jun— wait, where are you going??”

junhui sprinted out of the dorm and raced downstairs. 

where the hell was he??

he passed yanan, who shouted at jun,

“JUN WE PAS— WHERE ARE YOU GOING?”

down the hallway he went, until he reached the door that read 

“CEO OFFICE”

he turned the doorknob,

mr choi and mr yoon were sat at the desk, talking in hushed voces before they stopped upon seeing jun,

“who- junhwi? what are you doing here?”  
“where’s myungho?”  
“myung- oh why are you worried about that, congratulations on passing!! tomorrow we’ll discuss the details of your trainee contract”  
“sir, i really must know where myungho is. he went into the solo audition room early, and he didn’t leave. i haven’t seen him since”

the two men looked at each other, sighing. mr yoon walked up to jun and put a hand on his shoulder,

“junhwi... sit down on the couch, okay?”

the bubble that was his anxiety grew in jun’s stomach as he sat on the couch behind him. he bounced his legs impatiently. why was mr yoon telling him to sit? why couldn’t anyone just tell him where minghao had gone? why did nobody seem to know, or care??

“we called myungho in early because from the beginning, we had our eyes set on him becoming a trainee. he showed tremendous potential, so we wanted to see him first to solidify our choice of choosing him. but...”

mr yoon paused, looking back at mr choi who had a concerned look on his face. jun just wanted to tell the man to get to the point and tell him where the hell minghao was,

“well... he did his audition, but... it seemed he... made a wrong move during his breakdancing routine... the doctors told us the muscle had already gone through an ACL tear, and was severely damaged due to overexertion... so when he did the move, and his leg... went the wrong way, we had to stop his audition because he severely injured himself. he couldn’t even walk, we had to carry him out in a stretcher, but we told staff to clear the way, we didn’t want the kids to see that so he’s currently at the hospital—“

junhui was out the door before he could hear mr yoon’s next words. he bolted outside the building and ran, ignoring the shouts of mr choi and mr yoon.

all he could do was run. he wanted to run to the ends of the earth, to run back to shenzhen. to run back to yesterday, to live in the cherry blossom date forever. 

he found the bench and sat down, heaving sobs as he curled up in a ball.

again, there was no one around. only the whoosh of the wind as dead sakura flowers blew in the the wind. suddenly, the wind seemed harsh and cold. the withering sakura trees weren’t pretty at all; just pathetic and ugly. 

he did not look up when he heard footsteps approach him and sit down next to him. nor when he heard mr yoon’s voice say,

“... he’s at the hospital. recovering. they think he might need surgery... “

jun calmed himself down in order to speak,

“... s-so he d-didn’t... pass...?”  
“... no, he didn’t. we couldn’t fairly pass him”  
“w-will he e-ever dance a-again?...”

there was a drawn-out, dreadful, sickening silence. the harsh wind only roared louder, petals swirling in the wind’s vortex as the cold sent shivers down junhui’s spine. 

“it’s not likely” 

-

“i’ll come again tomorrow like usual. i’ll bring more bao, okay?”

silence, as usual. minghao only stared out the pitch-black window as rain poured like crazy, hitting the glass in a frenzy and sliding down endlessly.

junhui knew he couldn’t get the boy to speak. so he simply patted his cast and walked out of the room.

the rain was unforgiving, but jun was used to it. he found solace in the backseat of a taxi as it drove him back to the sc building.

sleeping that night was even harder than usual. jun didn’t know why; it wasn’t like today was any different than any of the others for the past 3 weeks. 

sneaking out of his room, he entered the kitchen and poured himself a class of milk which he heated up. his mom would make this for him when he couldn’t sleep as a kid, so he hoped it’d work for him as a teenager.

as he drank his milk, junhui reflected on the day, trying to think of anything he did differently.

he woke up in a cold sweat as usual, from dreaming about minghao dying. it never got easier to bear; and it happened almost every night. the same way; minghao getting into a car accident as he crossed the street on a rainy night. some dumbass on his phone. not noticing a boy crossing the road.

then he attempted to get out of bed, laying there for about 30 minutes until finally being dragged out by soonyoung shortly after waking jihoon up. 

he got dressed, ate a quick breakfast, and headed to his korean-language study class. he had it every other day, but today was friday, so it was a language class day. his korean was improving at a snail’s pace, but learning in general was harder for jun these days. he had little motivation for virtually anything.

after lunch, he had practice until late at night. junhui was falling behind, and it showed; normally, he got choreo down the quickest, but it now took him ages to learn simple moves. his singing was mediocre at best; his instructor said his technique was good, but he lacked passion in his voice.

well no shit. how could they expect jun to be anything even near normal after what had happened?

but junhui knew he couldn’t take it out on them. they had no idea the extent of his relationship with minghao. they didn’t know how badly jun fell for him, then how badly he had his heart shattered into broken pieces just after.

once practice was over, which usually at about 9:30-10 PM (today it let out at 10), he made his way over to the hospital. he usually took a taxi alone; his friends had only visited once. 

he’d usually take something for minghao; sometimes food, sometimes little frog memorabilia, like keychains, or small plushies, and even a book once; it was one that minghao mentioned he wanted to read. 

but he didn’t open it once. it sat on his bedside table in the same position, day after day.

today, he had taken fresh bao from the chinese restaurant they had their date at.

he talked to minghao a bit. told him that it was like the opposite of when jun was sick and minghao had brought him bao. 

minghao stayed silent. he’d sometimes say a couple words, but tonight, he was completely silent. 

then he asked how recovery was going. jun knew he only had to stay in the hospital another 5 days before being cleared. he assumed he’d go back to live with his parents; minghao had not discussed that with him.

then he left. went home, then went to bed.

well, tried to go to bed.

the day was like any other. so junhui still didn’t know why he simply couldn’t fall asleep, even when he was exhausted.

something did happen though, that was out of the ordinary.

minghao had pulled out a small notebook as he stared out the window and watched the rain, the occasional car driving by and splashing the window in even more water.

he began to write in it, and junhui asked what he was writing,

“hey, what’s that...?”

minghao kept writing, not acknowledging him.

“is it... for your song? remember the one you showed me, well on accident...but you said it wasn’t finished right?”

suddenly minghao whipped his head to stare at jun. he narrowed his eyes, pausing. he let out a small sigh, then nodded before going back to writing. 

jun didn’t press on. so technically, minghao wasn’t completely silent. he said “yes”... granted, through body language. in the simplest of ways.

that couldn’t be why jun was having such trouble sleeping.

but by now, he knew what was bothering him. he wanted to forget it the moment he heard it, but now it just played like a broken record through his mind.

as he was walking out of minghao’s room, he heard voices coming from around the corner. he recognized one as being minghao’s dad, so he listened,

“...well we were thinking of actually going back to china. he failed the audition, and it looks like he really won’t be able to dance again with how badly he tore his ACL, right?”  
“correct. there’s a chance that he could with extensive physical therapy, but even then, i’d advise against the strenuous sort of dance that myungho engaged in for a long time”  
“business is taking off again in liaoning, so it’d be more profitable to move back there. perhaps when minghao fully recovers, he can finally pursue something a bit more... stable. i mean really; we never should’ve let him audition. look where it ended up for him”

footsteps neared junhui, so he quickly exited the hallway and soon the hospital. 

just thinking about minghao moving back to china was too much for jun to bear. so he pretended he hadn’t heard the conversation, just blocked it out of his mind as he waved down the taxi to take him back.

weirdly enough, as much as the news pierced junhui like a knife had gutted into his heart, he didn’t cry. it was like he was all dried up; all the tears he had shed the past few weeks were the last his body could produce, and now, he held in his pain without release. 

eventually, soonyoung walked into the kitchen. at first, he didn’t notice junhui, but he jumped a bit when he did,

“what are you doing...?”  
“i can’t sleep....”  
“you’ve been really fucked up lately, huh”

he just nodded. as much as he loved soonyoung, he didn’t have the energy to speak to him. he never had the energy to speak; except to minghao.

soonyoung opened the fridge and scooped out some kimchi from a large container. he munched on it and sat next to jun,

“you were a lot close to minghao then you let on”  
“how do you know?”  
“god dude, why else are you this upset all the time? we’re all really worried about you. you haven’t been yourself in weeks. tell us what’s up”

soonyoung’s eyes, though tired and slightly puffy from sleepiness, were kind. jun could tell soonyoung genuinely cared and wanted to help. 

but again, he was too tired and drained to talk about it all. it was too painful anyway; he didn’t know when he’d be ready to talk about minghao.

“just... we became really good friends. we had a lot in common, even if it didn’t seem that way. i knew you guys didn’t like him, so i just kept him away from our friend group”  
“so you were really upset about his injury”  
“of course. we..... we promised to train together. and to debut together. to be famous singers, dancers, even actors. and then the next day he fucking injures himself so badly that he can’t ever dance again? what kind of shit is that, really....”

he downed the rest of his milk. jun was getting angry again; he knew he was scary when he was angry. he didn’t like it. 

soonyoung gave him a quick hug,

“i get it. i didn’t, no one did, know how you guys were close. we’re all here for you, okay? we’re your friends, junhui, we always want to help”

jun just nodded again. he was getting sleepy, finally.

as he drifted away, he thought about the dead sakura trees. how beautiful they seemed when he was on his date with minghao, and how ugly they truly were when he saw them as he ran out after hearing the news about minghao.

he wondered whether he romanticized minghao. he wondered if he’d ever know his true intentions. if he’d ever speak to him again, fully. why he wasn’t speaking; if jun was being honest, it was a bit silly and immature. he was perfectly capable of talking, if he’d swallow his pride a bit....

he rolled over in bed. minghao? being his soulmate? the one connected by the red string of fate?

junhui almost laughed. 

what a load of shit.

-

“i’m sorry, but once a patient’s been discharged, we have no control over where they go... we can contact the parents, if you want...”

it was no use getting mad. jun couldn’t get mad at a hospital; it was wildly inappropriate.

fighting back his tears, he simply nodded at the woman and told her it wouldn’t be necessary. he knew the xu family wouldn’t pick up. 

he hated them. hated the dad, the mom probably wasn’t any better. they took minghao, just like that. a full 4 days before his official release date. how did they even do that? they probably bribed the doctors with their money. jesus. 

junhui couldn’t believe this was happening again. once again, xu minghao was out of his life. as suddenly as he appeared, he was suddenly ripped out from it. 

it was clear the universe didn’t want them together. none of this pain was worth a boy who probably didn’t even love jun in the first place. 

as he ran out of the hospital and back to his dorm, he wished he would never see minghao again. never hear his stupidly cute voice, his bubbly giggle, his long, soft hands, perfectly pink lips, frog eyes, button nose, soft hair. 

even his name was stupid. xu minghao. junhui wished he would never hear it again, either. 

his legs burned; the dorms were much too far to walk, but jun just wanted to use his legs. he wanted to feel them burn and ache; it got out his frustrations.

he imagined the dead sakura trees. how ugly they must look now. he might never think they were pretty again.

when he got back, he dug through the luggage that he hadn’t completely unpacked yet. something large and green was poking out, so he pulled it out.

qīngwā. yang yang’s frog. 

the same as the one junhui gifted to minghao. 

he had forgotten all about it; he had intended to show it to minghao when they first became close, but he forgot.

it served no purpose now. all it brought was painful memories. it was old and dirty too. how useless.

junhui stared at it for a while. for a second, he considered keeping it.

but then he stood up, went to the kitchen, and stuffed it into the trash can. 

-

the string tangles up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> not gonna lie, i cried writing this. it got much more personal and emotional than i thought it would; i just couldn’t stop writing it. 
> 
> minghao isn’t really the best person, i know. they had a toxic relationship; minghao was manipulative of jun, and was never really clear about what he wanted to him. and jun’s friends didn’t like him; almost always a red flag.
> 
> so next chapter, i’ll write in his pov, so we can see his thoughts process and what his true intentions really were. i’lll also continue the story a bit through minghao’s pov. because of it, it might be longer, so be patient on when it’ll come out. 
> 
> minghao will grow up; he’s still very immature emotionally, the completely opposite of jun. god i wanna give that boy a hug :(
> 
> just remember this will all end happily! they’ll meet one more time, and they’ll end up together again happily <3
> 
> thank you if you’re reading this and supporting this fic, it means a lot!!


	6. minghao’s pov

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> with every fiber of strength he could muster, minghao told himself that he didn’t like this boy. that he didn’t think he was cute, he couldn’t think that, because boys didn’t like other boys. he would be normal and like a girl, just like everyone else.
> 
> but of course, his stupid teacher had to pair him up with this boy (who now had a name. junhui). 
> 
> and of course, minghao fell for him.
> 
> **TRIGGER: parental abuse, nothing described in graphic detail but minghao’s parents do hit him and treat him poorly**

“why do i even have to practice piano?? i hate it!!”  
“what kind of a question is that?? you aren’t getting dinner until you get that part right, stop crying!!”

minghao cried out from the pain at his dad slapping his hands and forcing them back onto the piano keys. he continued to heave out sobs, heavy tears staining the pearly white piano. his mom, who had been lurking in the corner, watching, walked over and put her hand on his shoulder,

“why are you crying so much, minghao?”  
“because piano is stupid!!! i hate it!! i don’t wanna do it!!”  
“piano is good for you. you’re so good at it too, you’re just frustrated that you can’t get this part down, right?”  
“no!!! i just hate it!!”

blinking away his tears, minghao looked at the sheet music in front of him. he hated it with a passion; all he wanted to do was rip it up to a million pieces and never touch the piano again.

but he forced himself to play the part over again. it was certainly difficult, requiring multiple octave jumps from the right hand and finicky chords from the left that made his hand cramp up. he neared the part that he always messed up on, and he could sense his dad’s eyes watching him intently. 

“pointer finger to G#”

he told himself, finally getting the complicated maneuver down. he stopped, letting his hands fall off the piano. as minghao sniffled, he felt his dad slap him on the back,

“there, wasn’t so hard was it?”

he wanted to scream and tell his dad that yes it was, it was hard, that he’d been here for more than an hour and his hands hurt, he was hungry, and his eyes were puffy from crying. he wanted to ask why he even had to do piano in the first place. he had asked it before, but they only ever said that it was “good for him”. he didn’t exactly understand why.

dinner that night was relatively silent as usual, but suddenly his mom put her fork down and looked at him,

“minghao... your father and i were talking, and we decided that we should enroll you in a... regular school. you’re getting older, there’s only so much that we can teach you. we were able to get you into a private school that mr. yang owns, do you remember mr. yang?”

minghao did not remember mr. yang, and figured he was just another one of the endless friends of his dad’s, but he was more interested in the school part. 

he had been home-schooled for his entire life. his parents taught him math, chinese, even english, on top of the countless other activities they forced him to do. thus, he didn’t get to hang out with many kids his age. this was worsened by the fact that his parents rarely let him leave their gigantic estate; they believed they had everything here, so why leave?

even when minghao expressed his desires to have friends over, they almost always refused. explaining that friends weren’t important, that they’d only distract him from his studies. 

the only real time he got to spend time with other kids were his wushu classes. he had been going since he was 4, and it was the only activity his parents forced him to do that he genuinely enjoyed. he even began learning how to b-boy; he enjoyed it so much that he often dreamt about becoming a professional dancer. 

but he wouldn’t dare bring that up to his parents. they were already wary of his wushu teacher teaching him to b-boy, so if they learnt that minghao wanted to take it more seriously, they’d surely forbid him from going to lessons.

so his days were spent at home, miserable, being forced to learn from his strict, controlling parents. but like his mother said; he was getting older. he was almost 10, and his desire to go to normal school grew stronger and stronger each day. he knew that there had to be stuff that his parents didn’t teach him, stuff that maybe they didn’t want to teach him that was taught in regular school. but more than that, minghao so desperately wanted to be with kids his age. 

and now, he would be. to say he was excited was an understatement; the boy was ecstatic. he would start school in a week, and throughout the process of purchasing the uniform and necessary supplies and books, minghao would obsessively imagine his new life at school. what sort of kids would be in his class? what would he learn? would his teachers be nice? mean? would he learn the same stuff as he did from his parents? would make friends, and would he be allowed to hang out with them outside of school?

finally, the fated monday morning arrived, and minghao leaped out of bed. he wanted to get to school early, so he inhaled his breakfast and waited impatiently by the door for his parents, backpack slung across his shoulders that bore his freshly-washed uniform.

unable to contain himself, he opened the door, shouting,

“i’m going to wait outside!!”  
“no, stay in he—“

he ignored his mother and sprinted outside, down the long path, across the field, and out the front gates.

breathing heavily, minghao looked west,

like an oversized tree root, the river mightily ran its course down the length of the forest surrounding it. he had not been down there in months; he was too busy with school.

his feet moved before his brain did, and before he knew it, he was dashing across the evergreen grass towards the river. he doubted he had enough time to get back in time before his parents found out where he had gone, but he didn’t really care. he just wanted to see the river up close.

he hopped over the rocks that jutted out from the river and made his way into the thick of the forest. he was worried that he would not be able to find it, but just like that, he spotted the clearing up ahead.

the pond looked the same as minghao remembered it; plants and lily pads grew atop the clear water, the morning sunlight seeped through the thickly-leaved trees and illuminated the water, casting a bright, blinding reflection. it smelled fresh; he caught a whiff of aromatic flowers that gently flowed through the air. birds chirped and chittered from above, leaves rustling from squirrels darting across the ground. 

as he crouched by the pond’s shore, a vivid memory overcame him...

“i caught one!!!”

minghao whipped his head around to look at junhui, who held a small frog in his cupped hands. his eyes were bright like stars, a smile overtaking his face. minghao couldn’t help but smile and laugh as well. it felt like a million butterflies had let loose in his stomach when junhui smiled. it was so nice...

“woah!! it’s so cute!!”  
“w-will it jump out?”  
“no, just stay relaxed, it’s probably scared....”

the frog stayed still in junhui’s shaky hands. minghao peered over and watched it. it was so small; he wondered if it was a baby. 

eventually, jun’s hands became steady, and minghao watched as his body relaxed. he breathed out,

“.... it is kinda cute”  
“see? you found one fast. you’re a natural frog catcher”

junhui smiled again, and minghao felt that tug in his stomach again. he really really liked when junhui smiled. 

the minghao that crouched near the pond on the morning of his first day of regular school suddenly became aware of the absence of his frog-catching partner from two summers ago.

junhui didn’t run across his mind too often. when he learned that his grandmother had died, he tried every way he could to contact him. he looked up the last name “wen” in the shenzhen area, but there were so many that he didn’t know where to begin. he even asked his parents if they knew any wen’s, but they said they didn’t and why was he asking anyway. so he didn’t press it further.

it hurt. for a long time, it hurt that minghao had no way of contacting junhui, but eventually, the memories became hazier and hazier until minghao had almost forgotten about the boy completely. but at random times, even in dreams, strangely vivid memories of the times they spent together would flash through his mind; like flashbacks in a book or movie. he wasn’t even sure if they were real memories; how did he remember them with such detail?

that pang in his chest and stomach, the feeling that he got immediately following junhui’s departure, came back again upon returning to the pond. 

minghao thought he could’ve stayed at its shores for the rest of the day, but he really didn’t want to be late for school. so as he ran out of the forest and came to a clearing that led to large expanses of unused, dried-up farmland, he looked west.

the small house still stood. like a memorial. he remembered his one time going there, which was coincidentally also the time that junhui left him. he wondered if it’d ever get taken down, since no one lived there anymore. all of junhui’s grandma’s animals went to the neighbors, and the soil had not seen crops being grown in it for almost 2 years.

the clouds parted, and the sun rose up out of them and shined brightly across the landscape. the far-away mountains circled the valley, and everything seemed to stand still. minghao thought the scene was straight of out of a movie. it was so pretty.

“MINGHAO... WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING DOWN THERE??”

his dad’s voice ruined the moment. he turned to see him looming on the other side of the river, a dark shadow contrasting against the brightly-colored morning scenery. 

sighing, he hauled ass towards the river, wondering how crazy his dad was for making his way all the way down here just to yell at him when he was the one making minghao wait to go to school.

——

the ball hit minghao square in the chest, knocking him off his feet and sending him tumbling backwards, his ass slamming down on the concrete.

“hey, that was right at you minghao! why’d you miss it?”

he quickly stood up, ignoring the dull ache in his tailbone and the burn of his hands that had scraped against the ground in an effort to stop his fall. his friends had not noticed how hard he had fallen.

“sorry, i just wasn’t expecting it”  
“told you he wasn’t good at sports”

the other kids laughed, but the boy in the square across from minghao smiled,

“come on guys, the game just started. give him a break”

the boy walked over and retrieved the ball from minghao, who’s ears turned red as the boy neared.

“have you played four square before, minghao?”

he just shook his head, desperately trying to not make eye contact with the boy, 

“well see, he just doesn’t know the rules. i’ll teach you, okay?”

the boy, xiaojun, went over the rules, but all minghao could focus on was his pretty double eyelids and deep cupid’s bow.

minghao wasn’t normally this distracted or nervous. even if his friends didn’t know it, he had wicked-fast reflexes and would’ve definitely caught the ball had he not been so preoccupied with his plans for later that day.

the nerves only intensified as the last bell rang and kids scurried out of class. despite the fluttering of his heart and his sweaty palms, minghao kept a close distance from xiaojun as he walked through the halls with his friends. he was so tall; they were only 11, but the boy towered over nearly everyone else at the school.

the crisp autumn air cooled minghao as he walked out of the building, swirls of red and orange leaves danced across the campus and crunched under bike tires.

minghao took a deep breath, walked closer to xiaojun, and called out his name.

him and his group of friends turned. he stepped closer to minghao, smiling the smile that made the boy’s brain feel mushy,

“hey, minghao, what’s up?”

he looked over xiaojun’s shoulder and stared at the group of boys, which included the boys who had played four square with him and xiaojun earlier. they looked at minghao, smirking.

mouth dry, he barely sputtered out,

“can we talk alone?”

xiaojun turned towards his friends,

“wait for me?”

they simply grumbled, but xiaojun followed minghao to stand next to the staircase,

“did you want to talk about the biology project?”

his smile was warm, but minghao only felt his hands go stiff from the cold. he had to do it now; he’d be pushing this back for months,

“ah...no... um...”

he suddenly wished he had gone through with the note idea. it’d be way easier than facing him in person. but he chickened out, and was left to awkwardly fumble and fidget in front of the most popular boy in school,

“i.... xiaojun, this is gonna be so weird, and you’ll think i’m weird, i know it. but i’ve been wanting to tell you this for a really long time, and i just really can’t handle it anymore. i like you. a lot. like.... even more than a friend. you were the only person who was kind to me when i started at this school, and even when i became friends with more people, you always wanted to hang out with me and be my friend. you’re so.... kind, and smart, and funny, and.... nice to look at but um... i was just wondering if maybe you wanted to go out to the movies or something, or wherever i don’t really care...”

minghao thought that steam must be pouring out of his red-hot ears as he stared at the ground, chest beating out of his chest. he really did it. he told xiaojun that he liked him.

the silence thickened, and went on for longer than minghao would’ve thought, so he hesitantly looked up to meet the tall boy’s eyes.

to his horror, his expression was a mix of confusion and disgust. he frowned, stepping back from minghao,

“you... what?? you’re gay??”

minghao couldn’t talk; it felt like a lump had formed in his throat and was preventing him from speaking. he watched as xiaojun slowly backed away from him, his confusion forming into pure anger and disgust,

“ew.... i’m sorry, but i don’t agree with people being gay, it just isn’t right. i thought you were cool minghao, but.... just stay away from me okay? you’re weird”

before minghao could get over his shock, xiaojun had run back to his friends. they all turned back to look at minghao, a couple of them shaking their heads and laughing. 

he slumped against the wall of the school and held his head in his hands. minghao did not remember the last time he had cried, but as his shoulders shook and he quietly sobbed, he realized what an idiot he was.

of course boys shouldn’t date. he knew that, but he thought that maybe, just maybe, xiaojun would be okay with it. he was always so kind, so polite, so perfect... minghao trusted him. 

but now he just thought he was weird. and different. and different was bad; minghao knew that. 

and being gay was certainly being different.

——

despite his longing for the chance to live in a big city, as minghao watched shenzhen go by from the backseat, he wanted nothing more than to go back home. 

he sat up and kicked the back of the passenger seat,

“minghao! don’t do that!”  
“why do i have to go to a regular school again, this is so stupid!”  
“we’ve talked about this so many times, it’ll only be for a semester, and it’s to get you some experience in the real world. you’re getting too spoiled for your own good”

“who do you think made me spoiled, then...” thought minghao. what hypocrites; they just wanted an excuse to kick him out and dump him with his aunt that he barely knew. 

“and why aren’t you guys moving out with me?”  
“because we don’t know yet if business here will be profitable. now stop asking stupid questions”

his dad frowned at him from the rearview mirror. minghao just rolled his eyes and continued to stare out the window.

it wasn’t like life back at home was that great; he didn’t have many friends, and most of the kids avoided him after finding out he was gay. but recently they’d stopped with that; he’d gotten so fed up with it that when some kid started teasing him, he punched him and knocked out one of his baby teeth. 

he still remembered the beating he had gotten from his parents. he didn’t regret it though, at least the teasing had stopped. 

but now, he was forced into a new environment with kids he didn’t know. truth be told, he had no interest in getting to know any of them, but he had promised his parents that he would *try* to be more friendly. 

emphasis on try.

-

“you can take a seat right there”

his new homeroom teacher motioned to an empty seat in the back. as minghao made his way towards it, he heard the girls up front giggle as he passed. 

but then he saw him.

staring right at him. 

he had a weird gut feeling upon meeting his eyes. he was oddly familiar in a way, but minghao was sure he had never met the boy. he couldn’t have, he’d never been to shenzhen before, there was no way they could’ve met.

nevertheless, minghao’s heart felt soft looking at him. at his big, striking double eyelids that sort of made him look sleepy. his deep cupid’s bow, and the little mole right above his lips. his hair was rather long, but it suited him it so well. 

they locked eyes for what seemed like eternity, but minghao quickly took his seat, realizing others were probably looking at him as well.

he tried to keep a calm composure, but internally, he was freaking out.

this boy was so cute. like, really really cute. so cute it made minghao flustered; and he didn’t get flustered. ever.

he was trouble. because minghao couldn’t like a boy. not now, not in this new school with new kids that he’s supposed to make a good impression on. 

he couldn’t be gay. maybe if he just ignored it, swallowed the warm, fuzzy feelings that this boy gave him deep, deep inside, they’d go away. 

with every fiber of strength he could muster, minghao told himself that he didn’t like this boy. that he didn’t think he was cute, he couldn’t think that, because boys didn’t like other boys. he would be normal and like a girl, just like everyone else.

but of course, his stupid teacher had to pair him up with this boy (who now had a name. junhui). 

and of course, minghao fell for him. 

-

everyone that minghao had invited but junhui was here. he knew he lived pretty far away, but he had really hoped he would be the first one to arrive. 

as he sat in a circle on the floor with everyone else, he kept sneaking glances at the door, ready to jump up and answer it the moment it rang.

but then he heard his name mentioned in the conversation,

“you invited junhui didn’t you minghao?”  
“yeah, he’s late, i hope he still comes”

some of the boys he’d seen hanging with junhui looked at each other. one of them said,

“so you’ve been hanging out with junhui a lot. why? he’s kinda weird...”

minghao froze. he knew that junhui was a bit of a loner, but he never expected people to not like him. he admitted that he was hard to get through to, but once you really got to know him, he was a normal kid, just like anyone else.

but he was way funnier. and smarter, in his own way, and nicer. and cuter. 

suddenly everyone chimed in; they all had something to say about junhui. that he doesn’t try in school. hadn’t had his first kiss yet. 

that he was gay.

it wasn’t supposed to, but hearing the kids make fun of junhui and call him gay broke a few of his heartstrings. minghao wanted to defend his friend, but he was scared. scared that they’d think he was gay too, and outcast him, bully him. he’d explode again, and then who knows what his parents would do to him. probably personally dig his grave.

so he went along with it. made fun of his friend, but as they sang happy birthday for him and he picked at his slice of cake, he couldn’t stop thinking about jun, and why he hadn’t shown up. maybe he got lost, or suddenly came down with a cold, or a million other possibilities that just didn’t seem right to minghao. junhui wasn’t the type to flake on people, he knew it.

yet the boy and the memory of him existed and eventually died only in minghao’s mind. he begged his parents to let him stay, just for a day. why did they suddnely have to leave? because business wasn’t working out in shenzhen? that’s all his dad ever cared about. business. not about his son’s mental or emotional well-being... so, minghao cried as a failed last resort, even if he knew it meant red marks from his father’s large hands, he didn’t care. 

as the city of shenzhen disappeared from the car window, minghao wondered if it was never meant to be. the universe clearly was against him being with boys. as it should be.... even if his heart was pulled towards them. 

but he knew he had to change. to put on a mask, to hide the ugly, unnatural thing about him. to fill his heart with hate; that was the only way he’d survive the unforgiving judgment of the world around him.

he felt his heartstrings tighten, like a ball of string becoming tangled. 

——

“why can’t you guys let me have one thing. just ONE”  
“not when the thing is a ridiculous dream that will bring shame on our family name!! out of all the things, you want to become a professional dancer??”  
“who cares about our family, this is MY dream!! you guys don’t understand how serious i am about this, i have potential if you would ever actually pay attention during my lessons, at least my own girlfriend does...-“

as soon as it spilled from his lips, minghao knew he fucked up. he caught his breath and stepped away from them, feeling their combined stares burning into his downturned head,

“you have a girlfriend??”  
“who is she? why didn’t you tell us about her?”

he said nothing, knowing the truth would result in a certain beating, whilst a lie could easily fall through the cracks and result in his certain death.

minghao sensed his parents looking at each other, pausing, before he heard his mother ask his father quietly,

“should we tell him?”  
“so soon?”  
“we have no choice...”

he snapped his head back up and looked between the two, who looked back at him with anger,

“tell me what??”  
“sit down for a second, son”

his dad pushed a chair towards him, but minghao stayed put. he fixed his gaze on them hard, desperately trying to figure out what in the hell they were talking about.

“do you remember the girl of the family we’ve been friends with since you were about 5?”

he didn’t, he barely paid attention to any of the family freinds he was forced to interact with. but he just grunted, which his dad took as a yes,

“they’re a very nice family, wealthy, and their daughter is your age... you seemed to get along well, so.... we thought that, once you two were old enough, we’d set up, you know, a marriage, it’s more common than you think, and it wouldn’t be sudden of course, you two would’ve gotten to known each other and-“

minghao never heard the end of his dad’s ridiculous explanation. he turned and stormed out the front door, ignoring the threatening yells of his parents as he ran down the stairs of their shiny, newly-built penthouse complex and out on the public street until his legs instinctively led him to the large cherry blossom tree in the park nearby, where he roared and kicked the tree, letting all his frustrations out as petals gently rained down on him, sticking in his hair.

his parents wanted him to marry a girl he didn’t know. to control his life down to choosing the person he’d spend the rest of his life with. he hated them more than anything, and he wanted to prove to them that they couldn’t control everything in his life. he was only 16 and his whole life had already been planned down to his life-long partner.

minghao knew he had to prove them wrong. that they couldn’t control that part of his life at least, that he should be free to love who he wanted.

a thought occurred to him. a scary one, one that minghao had worked for years to suppress, but couldn’t be ignored now. 

the fact that he loved boys, not girls. at least, last time he checked. the thought of being in a relationship with a girl did truly disgust him, but he convinced himself it was because he never actually had been with a girl before, so he just didn’t know. 

he told himself that he needed to do just that; be with a girl. maybe it’d comfort his parents, make them realize they didn’t have to arrange any sort of marriage for him, and that they didn’t have a little gay boy who wanted to be a dancer as their only son.

he’d lied in telling his parents he had a girlfriend. well, sort of; he knew a girl liked him, she’d seen him show off his b-bboying during break at school and his friends told him that her friends told them that she liked him. 

at least he had a starting point for all this.

-

no one particularly liked her, not even minghao, but he was determined on spiting his parents. she wasn’t the best at school, her parents made an average income, and she didn’t have the best of manners. a combination that did not please his parents. 

she was pretty, sure, minghao could acknowldge that, but when they kissed, he felt nothing. he wondered what the fuss was about in movies, why kissing was made up to be this euphoric, grand, earth-shattering moment when in reality, his girlfriend’s lips were a bit chapped and her breath smelled. 

but they stayed together, nearly a year, and nothing changed. not even when they lost their virginity to each other; it was awkward and pretty gross and she said it hurt. is this how it’s supposed to all go??

nevertheless, minghao stayed afloat by pushing himself in dance even harder. he knew that in order for his parents to even accept he had potential to become a pro in dancing, he had to become exceptional to the point they couldn’t not notice him. despite concerns from his girlfriend that he didn’t spend much time with her, he practically lived with his instructor in the practice room, working his body passed the limit; eliciting him being driven home because he was so exhausted he couldn’t even walk.

after practically begging his parents to come watch him participate in a local competition, he was eager to find them among the crowd, looking a bit concerned at the rowdy and unruly nature of the spectators.

he placed 3rd, which, considering the age and experience of the competitors against minghao’s, was amazing, but he knew he had to be number 1 in his parents’s book.

that’s why he was stunned to find them talking with his teacher after the competition, who must have worked some sort of magic as they told him on the drive home that they’d enroll him in the performing arts school 2 hours away.

that’s why he was floored to find out a scout had attended his competition, and contacted his teacher and parents to offer him a scholarship at an even better performing arts school in seoul, south korea where he’d have the opportunity to become a trainee at one of the best entertainment companies in the country.

he nearly jumped for joy when his parents told him the news, but he knew he couldn’t celebrate just yet; there was a high chance his parents wouldn’t let him go. minghao prepared himself for the worst, for days of convincing, screaming, beatings. he thought about the promises he could make them, how he’d promise to make it big, to bring pride to the family name or whatever the hell they wanted.

but after two eternities of an hour, his parents came out of their room and told him that he could go, so long as he kept his grades up. 

after pausing for a moment to realize that he was going to south korea and attending a top performing arts school to possibly train under a top entertainment company, he thanked his parents profousely before sprinting out of the house, out the gates, down to the cherry blossom in the park and screamed, but this time, in joy, because something was finally going right for him. it was just an opportunity, but minghao didn’t care, because he knew he’d take full advantage of it until it was guaranteed he had a future in dancing.

-

he fit in well at the school; it was international, so he had other chinese kids to speak to, but it wasn’t long before he picked up on korean and became nearly fluent in just under a year. to keep his parents happy, he kept up his grades at school, and to keep his girlfriend happy, they called and facetimed frequently. he had considered breaking up with her numerous times, but the timing never felt right, and he’d become so complacent with her that he was convinced he’d just eternally be her boyfriend. 

one thing stayed consistent through his international move, though; his practicing. he continued to push himself, staying behind long past the end of lessons to perfect that one move. there was no doubt in his mind he could be anything less than perfect.

until one day, he pushed himself to the breaking point. he didn’t stretch properly before practice, and one slightly wrong move on his part resulted in a bad tear in his acl.

he didn’t need surgery, but the doctor and physical therapist were hesitant on minghao auditioning for sc entertainment, the top company, the day for which was rapidly approaching. 

but minghao knew that he’d audition no matter what. he wasn’t about to let his only opportunity slip away from him because of an avoidable injury; even when his parents expressed concern at his intentions to audition. he was determined, and thinking back on it, he was sure that’s what got him in as he didn’t perform to his standard that day. he knew that if he hadn’t been injured, the company probably would’ve presented him a trainee contract right then and there.

it didn’t matter though, because he was in, and just one more trial away from becoming an official trainee. 

yet, as he stood alone in the crowded lobby of sc entertainment among dozens of other wannabe trainees, and spotted the drowsy, heavy lided eyes of a boy that looked all too familiar staring right at him before bolting into a restroom, he knew that there were many more trials to come as he felt his heartstrings tug, because he still had feelings for wen junhui.

-

minghao clicked his phone off, setting it aside before laying down and staring at the ceiling. he could hear jun stirring a bit in the bottom bunk, before he heard the familiar click of a phone, and jun was soon fast asleep.

he thought about the conversation the two just had over text. it was obvious how smitten junhui was with him, and it wasn’t like minghao didn’t feel the same. there were just times where it was still scary. he had nightmares of him being outed, both of them, his parents finding out, furious, making him go back to china, sending him to a bad, bad place where they thought they could beat the gay out of you.

when the inevitable text from his ex came that she wanted to break up, he wasn’t particularly sad. it was just the realization that he could never be with a girl and be happy that overwhelmed him, caused him to break down and pour his heart out to jun. he couldn’t deny how right everything felt with him; he fit perfectly into the older boy’s arms, safer than he’d ever really felt. 

and when they kissed... god. his heart still pounded every time he thought of it, jun’s lips were so intoxicating, and the idea of going further one day didn’t seem awkward or gross like it once had to minghao, but exciting, new, and maybe even beautiful.

he often thought it was too good to be true. that despite how right it felt, the world didn’t think their relationship was. it tore him apart, thinking they might have to be secret for who knows how long. that he could never introduce him to his parents, who he knew they’d love, what with his polite, kind, gentle demeanor...

or even any of their friends. even if the younger generation might be more accepting, he couldn’t forget the peers he encountered back in china, that bullied jun, that rejected minghao because of who he loved.

it was a miracle he fell asleep that night, with all the thoughts racing through his head, but he thought that if he could make it big, with junhui by his side, they’d be able to work it out together. no matter the circumstances.

-

it was expected that minghao’s world shattered in a fraction of a second. just like his acl. again.

all he remembered was horrible pain in his ankle, then waking up in a cold, blindingly white hospital room.

he had apparently undergone surgery, but he didn’t remember a thing. all he knew when he woke up was that his dreams had vanished into thin air. that’s too soft; they had been torn apart, destroyed, incinerated. 

he didn’t need the ceo to come and tell him that they couldn’t pass him. or the empty sorries and other words from his trainee friends, especially the ones that had passed.

when junhui finally showed up, minghao was too drained, he felt like he’d never move from his hospital bed, even after his discharge date. his heart and mind ached, more than his ankle; he knew he should talk to junhui. but he was too saddened by having to give up on his life-long passion to even think about mending what they had together. he didn’t even know if he could love again. 

the scarce energy he could draw up when he wasn’t sleeping or picking at his meals was used in pouring over his notebook. he had it since his time in the performing arts school, where he used it to plan out routines or sketch out choreography, but had since become a creative outlet for minghao, as he could no longer use his body. he’d let his frustrations out on the page, scribbling all over, tearing out pages, puncturing holes through the paper, using up the eraser on his stubby pencil. 

he often returned to the unfinished song that was written there. mediocre lyrics, some guitar notes and melodies. he didn’t know if he’d ever finish it. inspiration was nowhere to be found in his sterile, white room.

until it started to pour night after night. it was like the sky shed its tears as the sun was swallowed up by the moon, buckets and buckets being sloshed onto sidewalks by cars that drove by minghao’s window. 

he watched the silhouettes of pedestrians with umbrellas and imagined their lives. if they’d ever fallen in love. if they were living out their dreams in the city, or had given them up to find a stable source of income. 

it was on those rainy night minghao realized how utterly alone he was. he had no real friends out here, maybe even anywhere, and the one person he held closest to his heart was slipping away from him because of his own sickness. 

as he drifted to sleep, he made a promise to himself to tell junhui how much he meant to him before he got discharged him the hospital. that he was sorry that he’d ruined not just his dreams, but jun’s, theirs.

unfortunately, his parents picked the next morning to finally show up. they luckily spent most of the day out shopping after checking up on him when they first arrived, so he was alone when junhui stopped by for the day.

he had watched him walk from the taxi to the hospital entrance, as he always did. his silhouette fuzzy from the rain staining the glass window, but minghao knew it was him every time, and his stomach unknotted every time.

as he stared out the window into the rainy abyss, he mulled over his thoughts. it came to him in an instant, it all made sense, and his hands grabbed his notebook and began writing before his brain could tell them to.

he didn’t even feel when junhui had left, the fresh bao he had brought beginning to lose its steam, so minghao quickly dug in.

he turned back to his notebook and stared at what he’d just written,

on the streets that heavy rain has fallen upon  
the crowd is scarce, and few passerby will stay for me  
the cars that drive by occasionally  
stir up the peaceful rain  
the pigeon that takes flight occasionally  
may it be fearless  
all the silhouettes on the street don’t look like you  
pacing back and forth alone  
waiting for you  
waiting for you  
in this night i need you, baby

he felt his heart skip a beat. that was it. he could feel himself grinning, because he couldn’t wait to see junhui’s reaction when he showed him the lyrics.

but he knew his one final wish, to speak to junhui before he left the hospital, was too much for his god awful luck, as his parents informed him when they got back shortly after jun had left that he must return to china, there was nothing left for him in this city, that he’d start his real career back at home.

minghao wanted to argue; he knew he was in the right in letting the duration of his hospital visit play out, but he had no energy left. he barely spoke a word as nurses hurriedly prepared him to leave, giving him crutches, medication, telling him to continue seeing the doctor for x-rays. 

seoul was once again nothing but a speck from an airplane window, but this time, instead of watching where all his dreams would take place, he watched the city that had become home, that took his dreams, that took the only person he cared about in the world. 

he burrowed into his sweater, appearing to be asleep. with the plane eerily silent, he allowed himself a few tears, choked back sobs, and the pain of, well, everything, to flow through him again. 

—

once again, minghao’s life was dictated by routines. but this time, much simpler ones; he woke up, took his meds, stretched out his muscles, ate breakfast, went to physical therapy twice a week, ate lunch, laid around doing nothing, ate dinner, showered, then fell asleep. 

trouble started from the beginning, though. for months, he didn’t have the motivation to get out of bed. his parents would have to drag him out on days he had physical therapy, and going out just once tired him so much that he’d do nothing in particular for the rest of the day, or take a long nap. everything just seemed hopeless, his parents were no help, and he barely talked to anyone else.

he considered calling junhui. but the texts and calls had long stopped, so who knows if he would even pick up. if he still cared about him.

but one day, he picked up his phone and did it. it rung and ring, for what seemed like an eternity, until it said jun was unavailable, and to leave a voicemail. minghao considered for a moment, but the silence of the phone, expecting him to leave a message, scared him, so he quickly exited the call.

his body wasn’t faring well either, as he wasn’t used to being still for so long. he ached to move again, to use his once toned muscles and continue to perfect to art, but the reality that he could do none of it for a very, very long time was too much for him to bear. not to mention the aching in his ankle that persisted for weeks; he only realized the extent of his second tear then.

so passed the days, weeks, months, and year, as minghao recovered physically but not very much mentally, but he was better in his parent’s eyes so they sent him off to work. odd jobs that he could care less about, just going to escape his parents, until he began caring about the income. 

during his time bedridden, when he finally had more motivation to do something else, he spent a lot of time desperately wondering what else he could do to step foot in seoul again. what were his other passions? he had committed himself so fully to dancing that he really didn’t know who he was outside of it. although he enjoyed music, like songwriting, he didn’t see it becoming any more than a hobby, a way for him to let out his repressed, pained emotions. no, he needed something bigger; something his parents would agree to, something that he could count on making him into a star. 

so when minghao discovered the world of fashion and modeling, he knew he’d hit the jackpot. 

he always cared about his clothes, even when he had the luxury of affording designer brands, he chose his outfits not by their brand name, but by how nice they looked. he wasn’t as traditionally good-looking as junhui, but he knew he’d probably do well as a model anyway; what more was it than posing for a camera?

he researched opportunities in seoul and was met with hundreds of casting calls for models, most of which minghao fit the criteria for. even if the competition must be tough, he knew it was only chance to get back into that city with something to back him up.

after months of saving, deliberating with himself, rehearsing how he’d tell his parents, he was finally ready one evening, during dinner. they were going on about how minghao should go back to school to learn business so he could one day follow in his father’s footsteps, but he couldn’t take it any longer, so he interrupted them,

“can i talk to you about something?”

they blinked at him, pausing for a moment, before his mother glanced at her husband and then nodded,

“what is it?”

minghao took a deep breath, mentally preparing himself for any arguments to come.

“i understand, that you want me to take up dad’s business... it’s the safest option i have, and i’d be doing right in your eyes. but no matter how hard i try to imagine myself in his position, i can’t see myself doing it. i can’t see myself doing anything but entertainment. mom, dad... dance was my life. it was what motivated me everyday, what i knew i was best at, excelled at. i had a future laid out, you know. i would’ve made it big. but now that it was all taken away from me, i discovered a new passion. because i just want to be back in that city, god i loved it, it felt more like home than here ever did. i.. i belong there.”

he paused to watch his parents’s reactions. his mom was neutral, her eyes signaling she was listening intently, but his father was shifting in his seat a bit, tapping his foot and furrowing his brow more and more as minghao went on. but he wasn’t afraid of his dad anymore. nothing scared him. 

“so, i did a lot of research, and i think modeling would be a good path for me. there’s a lot of opportunities in seoul, more than dancing, and they make good money. i know i could do it; i’ll work hard, i can’t get hurt so there’s no reason i won’t succeed. i really love fashion too, so maybe once i get a foot into the industry i could be a fashion designer. but for now, i really think modeling could work out. i’m old enough, i’m going to be 20 in a few months, i’ll fly-“  
“you want to be a model??”

his dad lingered on the word, spitting it out like it was the most disgusting thing he’d ever heard. his eyes burned into minghao’s, who stared back with equal detrernination.

“i will never understand you. we let you chase your silly dreams of being a dancer, but they fail. so we continue to push you into business, where you could use your brains for something good, to follow in my footsteps and continue our family legacy and reputation, and you want to throw it all away again to become a model?? no. absolutely not, never in a million years will i let MY SON-“  
“STOP, STOP IT. didn’t we talk about this?? the boy lost his dreams, we knew he had the potential to be good, and now he wants to try again. he’s determined! he’s an adult, he’s old enough to do what he wants... let’s let him. give him one more chance, and if it doesn’t work out he’ll understand why we want him to study business. okay?”

his mom suddenly stop up and interrupted, shooting daggers at his father. he stiffened up, staring at her for longer than what seemed necessary before shaking his head and sighing, walking towards his room,

“fine. fine! be a model, but if you’re failing and have no money to live, don’t be so sure we’ll help you. or take you back in.”

as he slammed the door shut and minghao tried to process what just happened, his mom looked at him with tired eyes,

“you’re serious about this?”  
“completely.”  
“i’m not sure your father will pay for your rent or other living expenses when you arrive...”  
“that’s fine. i don’t wan- need your guys’s help. i’ve saved up enough to get me out there and pay for a few month’s rent; i’ll manage.”

his mom just nodded, not looking at him, quickly clearing her and her husband’s plates from the table and disappearing into their room.

minghao, for the first time in years, felt a rush of gratitude towards his parents; but just his mom this time. his dad reacted like he expected he would, but he didn’t expect his mother to stand up for him like that. she normally sided with his father, barely having her own opinions outside of his. but who knows what they had been discussing beforehand, to leave her challenging his views and supporting her son’s dreams.

he knew this was his last chance. before he was subject to someone else’s dreams of what his life should be. 

so this time, when seoul was forming from a speck from an airplane window into a city with people just like minghao, broken, but standing up again and chasing new dreams, he knew it’d work out. this time, he wouldn’t let his dreams, his love, slip away from him again.

-

the string loosens a bit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> decided to finish this after all yayy, it’ll probably only be 2-3 more chapters, but the next one will be pretty short, and still in minghao’s pov, but then it’ll finish up with jun’s again.


	7. yr 4- 2017 (pt 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he’d never been to a gay club before, but there was a first for everything, he supposed. he enjoyed his conversation with mingyu as well, and thought that maybe they could be more than just a hook-up.
> 
> *this is still in minghao’s pov*

night did not fall upon seoul. the sun had long disappeared, but the neon lights illuminated the streets so brightly that it was nearly impossible to fall asleep.

this, coupled with the fact that minghao was incredibly lonely, bored, and horny, was why the man was up at 2:37 AM swiping left on countless profiles. 

nearly all of them were straight men with boring-as-can-be profiles just looking to swipe right on any woman they saw.

for a moment, minghao considered swiping right on one of the women that popped up. she was only 3 miles away, worked at a popular makeup store, and dressed very nicely. her bio was quite witty as well.

but he stopped himself; he wasn’t that desperate. the last time he had sex with a woman was 8 months ago, when he was still in china, and it was horrible, to say the least. he was also pretty drunk, so that’s a testament so how bad the sex was.

what he really wanted, and what he didn’t necessarily want to admit to himself, was to have sex with a man. 

well, with a specific man. but the chances that he’d find him on a dating app nearly 2 years since he last heard from him were extremely unlikely. 

especially considering the fact he essentially ghosted the man because of his deep depression over losing his dream to become a dancer.

he also figured that their insane luck of meeting again in this very city all those years ago had run out.

nevertheless, he wanted to have sex with a man just to see how it felt. maybe losing his virginity to a guy through a hook-up wasn’t the best idea, but it wasn’t like he could ask any of the friends (that he didn’t have); “hey, wanna have sex with me so i can see how it feels to have sex with a man and find out if i’m actually just asexual?”

so, he changed his preferences in the app to male, and was immediately met with the face of a god.

kim mingyu. 20 years old. 5 miles away.

the man was gorgeous, and he knew it. minghao immediately swiped through his photos. each were perfectly shot; a few coy selfies, photos of him with friends, on the streets of seoul, what looked to be new york, tokyo, shanghai; he posed in countless cities with impeccable camera presence. he posed naturally, like the camera wasn’t even there at all; he had to be a model.

minghao scanned his bio, which simply read,

“we’re not socks, but i think we’d make a great pair ;)”

he snorted. he wasn’t expecting a model-like man to have as cheesy a bio, but he liked it. so he swiped right. 

almost immediately, they matched. he began wondering what this man was doing up so late, but he suddenly received a message,

from kim mingyu:

km: you’re photos are soooo good omg  
xm: *your  
km: oh so ur one of those  
km: figures. u look intimidating  
xm: are you a model?  
km: yea, for dazed

dazed was one of the biggest korean magazines out there, meaning mingyu was at least a c-star celebrity 

xm: seriously??  
km: yeah but i just got signed literally 3 days ago lmaoooo i haven’t gotten any work yet ;(  
km: what about you?

minghao considered lying: dazed was one of his favorite magazines, and even if they had rejected his application, impressing a dazed model would certainly get him the connections he desperately needed. 

but he realized that mingyu could easily search his name up and find little to nothing regarding his model career. so he told the truth, 

xm: i’m an aspiring model. still waiting to hear back from a couple agencies. competition is tough, isn’t it?  
km: ur photos are like professional like i said, also ur hot so you’re def model worthy haha but yeah competition is rough  
km: i got lucky i guess, i previously modeled for a small magazine and made a lot of connections thru them. honestly just making a lot of connections is key u know

minghao didn’t expect to be receiving modeling advice from a stranger on tinder, but he appreciated it nonetheless. however, he really was just looking for a hook-up, so he steered the conversation in a different direction;

xm: yes, it’s tough since i’m from china, i don’t know too many people out here. but thank you, your photos showcase your attractiveness very well  
km: ur so serious haha  
km: i know we’re both just looking for a hook up so u wanna meet up at the nightclub a couple blocks down?? i go all the time it’s a gay club ;))  
xm: sure. what time?  
km: 8? we can get a little drunk hahahaha  
xm: okay, see you there  
km: bye hottie ;)) also go to bed it’s 2 am  
xm: but you’re also up  
km: no i’m not look zzzzz  
km: zzzzz  
km: zzzzzzzzzz

minghao chuckled and turned his phone off, setting it on his nightstand and rolling over in bed.

he’d never been to a gay club before, but there was a first for everything, he supposed. he enjoyed his conversation with mingyu as well, and thought that maybe they could be more than just a hook-up.

-

there was no missing kim mingyu, as his impressive height made him easily distinguishable from the line that he stood in to get into the club. he wore a slightly-sheer white button up, unbuttoned down to reveal his chest muscles that dared to rip through the fabric. the rest of his outfit was as basic as it could get; fitted black trousers and simple black dress shoes, but god he looked incredible. coupled with purple aviators and electric-blue hair, mingyu definitely lived up to his model status. 

minghao walked up to the man, who had noticed him coming and looked up from his phone, smirking, 

“you look hot”

minghao wore a black velvet blazer over top a fishnet top that dared to expose his (freezing) nipples at any moment. he didn’t normally dress this risqué, lately he’d be attempting to refine and mature his style, but this was basically mandatory attire for going to a club, and he had wanted to impress mingyu. but of course, at the expense of his discomfort, as it was a chilly night, and the blazer offered little warmth.

as he approached, mingyu looked him up and down and nodded,

“not what i expected you to wear, but i am very much loving it. bet you’re freezing though”  
“quite. aren’t you?”  
“meh. as a model i’ve had to wear less clothing in colder weather, i’m used to it”

mingyu shuffled to the side and motioned for minghao to stand in front of him, but the person standing behind mingyu yelled out,

“no skipping the line!”

mingyu turned towards the man, who was a good 5 inches shorter than mingyu. he crossed his arms and cocked his head,

“are you really gonna be that anal about this?”  
“yes! they only let in a certain number of people, its not fair if he gets to cut”  
“he’s my date man, i’m letting him skip”  
“so you have some special privilege that allows you to let people cut in line?”  
“cut it out, that’s kim mingyu!!”

a new voice entered the argument, coming from a man stood behind the first one, eyes wide. 

mingyu uncrossed his arms and let out a small smile,

“oh, so you know me?”  
“of course!! you were on the cover of arena a couple months back!!”

the first man, who was clearly still angry, frowned at mingyu,

“are you a celebrity?”  
“i wouldn’t call myself one, i’m just a model”  
“he is one!! he has a fanbase and everything, he recently got signed as a full-time model for dazed!!”

mingyu’s fan excitedly hurried forward and pulled out his phone,

“can we take a selfie?”

mingyu smiled brightly and nodded. he effortlessly posed for the camera, slipping his sunglasses down to the tip of his nose and flashing a peace sign.

as minghao watched this whole exchange go down, he realized that mingyu was much more well-known than he had let on. he was still surprised he hadn’t heard of him before, but based on the fan’s reaction, he clearly had at least a dedicated fanbase. 

he wondered whether it’d be a good idea for his career to hook up with a celebrity. 

as the fan finished up taking selfies and furiously typed on his phone, mingyu glanced over at minghao and motioned for him to come over. the man from before still looked angry, but kept quiet as minghao stood next to mingyu in line.

the fan looked up and examined minghao,

“are you a model too? sorry, i don’t recognize you”  
“i... i’m an aspiring one”  
“so you’re friends with mingyu?”

suddenly, mingyu wrapped his arm around minghao’s shoulder and pulled him closer, smirking,

“actually, he’s my date. we just met!”

minghao was frozen. he wasn’t bothered by mingyu suddenly showing affection, but in front of so many people? and telling this stranger that they were more than friends? wouldn’t he know how that would affect his career??

but the fan just smiled widely and clapped his hands,

“aww, how cute!! you two look great together”

of course, minghao thought. he had forgotten! they were at a gay club; everyone here was just like them. they didn’t have to hide it, or come up with excuses or just say they were friends. no judgment here... no feeling uncomfortable hearing others being outright homophobic...

for the first time in a long while, minghao let himself fully relax.

as mingyu continued to be bombarded by fans left and right, minghao reflected on his past few months in seoul. 

he managed to find a one bedroom apartment in hongdae, which was his only win so far, as his landlord was a grumpy old man who reminded minghao every time he saw him when the rent was due. but he didn’t spend much time at home; he was out on the streets, taking any casting call he could, or traveling across the city to get to one.

he’d had some luck with smaller agencies, but it was like he bounced between them, and never rose up in the ranks to sign with a big modeling label; despite his growing portfolio and stunning fashion. they always turned him down; likely because he was a foreigner, and had virtually no connections to anyone in the industry. how could they trust minghao, a nobody in the modeling world?

but money was starting to become tight; he had a couple part-time jobs, yet they barely allowed him to pay rent, much less afford anything outside the essentials of food and transportation. but he promised himself that no matter what, he wouldn’t ask his parents for help. he’d lived his entire life not having to worry about money; he could get through a few more months if it meant finding a golden opportunity.

this was one of the first times he’d properly gone out during his second time in seoul; he both couldn’t afford it and was often too busy with job hunting to attempt building up his social life. and under the blaring music, beautiful men who weren’t hiding the fact they loved other men, and a famous date, he allowed himself to not think about work, his parents, or jun. minghao just wanted to be a young, 20-something-year-old having fun in the big city.

so he let mingyu call an uber for the two, who couldn’t stop giggling and touching each other in the backseat, and all the way to mingyu’s comfortable apartment.

and oh god did the model look delicious slightly tipsy, asking minghao if he wanted to go to his bedroom, soft kisses turning into desperate attempts at ripping each other’s clothes off.

when mingyu returned from the bathroom and kissed the boy’s forehead gently before muttering that he could stay the night, rolling over and falling fast asleep, minghao had not moved from when they had finished. he felt his blood rushing into all of his veins, like a tree, rooting in him and assuring him that it would all be alright. 

because god, god he didn’t know it’d be that wonderful. what the hell was he doing all this time? running away from the truth, because it scared him, but now he felt safe and secure in himself. 

minghao was so fucking gay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know this one was pretty short, the next one probably will be too but we’ll be back into jun’s pov/where he’s been. but there’s gonna be a love square once minghao and jun meet again, so it’ll all turn pretty messy.


End file.
